


Left Side Advantage

by susiecarter



Category: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, DC Extended Universe, Man of Steel (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Antagonism, Bad Decisions, Bad Flirting, Identity Porn, M/M, Self-Sacrifice, Superbat Reverse Bang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-01
Updated: 2018-05-01
Packaged: 2019-04-30 21:21:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 61,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14505717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/susiecarter/pseuds/susiecarter
Summary: Post-MoS AU: A year after Black Zero, the Metropolis city government decides to hold a commemorative gala, with Superman as a guest of honor. And after a year of trying to gather intelligence on Superman without all that much success to speak of, Bruce Wayne is definitely going to attend. Except it turns out he may not be the only one with plans for Superman, and there might be a few other pieces of the puzzle that he's been missing.Or: Bruce Wayne's illustrated, step-by-step guide to hownotto shake hands.





	1. Before you begin—know when to use a handshake.

**Author's Note:**

> \o/ WHEW. I am so, so lucky to have had the chance to work with Lio YET AGAIN, and their amaaaaaaazing [prompt (and additional artwork)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14505618) is the only reason this story exists, so please please please go look at it right now and tell them how spectacular it is! You don't even need to read this, okay, one of Lio's pieces is worth sixty thousand words—as evinced by how the prompt image alone got me to write this. :D And of course I owe a huge thank-you first and foremost to them, for the beautiful prompt, for their encouragement and enthusiasm, and for all their hard work on EVERYTHING they're doing as part of this bang. ♥ YOU'RE THE GREATEST AND YOU SHOULD FEEL GREAT ♥
> 
> Also, fic-specific thank-yous to [JustAWritingAmateur](http://www.archiveofourown.org/users/JustAWritingAmateur)/[jew-gi-oh](http://jew-gi-oh.tumblr.com/) YET AGAIN, for helping me keep myself on track with another fantastic playlist; and to everybody in the Discord who participated in the CRITICAL pre-deadline sprints I needed to finish this. COULD NOT HAVE DONE IT WITHOUT YOU GUYS, ILU, TY. ♥
> 
> This fic is basically the inside-out-and-backward remix of my last bang project: MoS and the first ten or so minutes of BvS happen as in canon, and then this diverges a year into the "18 months later" screen. It plays a bit fast and loose with the timeline, and especially the circumstances under which Lex Luthor first starts paying attention to Wally Keefe (I've made it happen differently and also earlier, just to make my own life easier). Also, basically everything this story does with Jimmy Olsen is 100% headcanon. Any and all Kryptonian worldbuilding _should_ be (*knocks on wood*) essentially compliant with movieverse canon, with a little of my own embroidering around the edges, but if I've accidentally contradicted something, please forgive me/pretend it was on purpose. :D
> 
> This is divided into sections by the handshake step Bruce is busy failing at; handshake instruction text was cribbed from [WikiHow's "effective handshake" article](https://www.wikihow.com/Have-an-Effective-Handshake) and [Wikipedia's entry on handshakes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handshake), with some light editing for sense and maximum thematic relevance.
> 
> Lio titled the prompt after the phrase "left side advantage", which refers to a perceived benefit in bodily positioning when shaking hands for a photo op; the person standing at the left of the photograph tends to appear "stronger", with the width of their body protected by their arm—in contrast to their partner on the right, who's forced to reach out and leave themselves exposed to the camera.

 

 

**Before you begin—know when to use a handshake.**

_The appropriate times to shake someone's hand include: the first time you meet, when you are introduced; at the beginning of a business or social meeting; to offer congratulations or express gratitude, or as a display of good sportsmanship._

 

"Oh, thank you—thank you so much, Superman!"

"Of course," Clark says, with Superman's grave little smile, touching one woman's shoulder comfortingly.

They're safe, for the moment—both of the women, the three kids who were in the back seat, the guy who was in the second car. Blown tire on an overpass, and Clark would have left it to emergency services except he'd heard metal giving way, one car smashing right through the guard rail and over the side. A whole second disaster waiting to happen when it landed on the highway below, and nobody else would have been able to stop it.

And he'd already been in the bathroom anyway. He'd been able to catch it before it even hit the ground.

Except he'd dented the car a little—hard to avoid, with the speed it had been going. And then he'd had to lift it back up to set it down, and free the second car that had almost followed it through, and make sure everyone was all right. And now he has to shake their hands and smile. Not that he minds, exactly. It's just that there's something a little bit off, and he can't concentrate on it, can't figure out what it is, until they let him go.

He waits with them until the police arrive, until their heartbeats have settled down a bit and their voices aren't shaking quite so much. And then he gives them a reassuring nod and leaps up into the air, and he can finally close his eyes and listen.

What _is_ that? He sets aside everything else, one sound at a time: the wind, his own heartbeat, every identifiable noise of cars and people and Metropolis; a hundred thousand footsteps, the clink of quarters into parking meters, the helpless buzz of ten million flies trapped in ten million windows—

There it is. The faintest little tone, much too soft for anyone else to hear. But there's something familiar about it—electronic, Clark thinks, that tiny hum of active circuitry that everything digital makes when he listens closely enough.

And there's something _doubly_ familiar about this one in particular.

It takes him less than a minute to find it. The first time he hadn't even known what he was looking for; but this is the fourth this month. And this one is even smaller than the first three—he might have missed it if he hadn't caught the gleam of a reflection off the tiny lens.

He plucks the camera off the roofline and stares into it, and feels a shiver of apprehension crawl up the back of his neck. Smaller and better-positioned: lodged in a crevice just in front of where a whole tangle of wiring passes through the interior ceiling. If Clark had been looking for it on a couple of his more interesting wavelengths, he might have dismissed it as part of the building's system and moved on.

And it might have been charging itself off the building's electricity, wireless, but it does have some kind of backup tucked inside its miniscule casing, because he can hear that it's still working even though he's pulled it loose.

"Who _are_ you?" he says into it—pointless, because even if whoever's watching him through it did answer aloud, wherever they are, he'd never be able to pick it out of the hundred thousand conversations happening around him. But these things keep showing up, and he doesn't know why, and it's _frustrating_. "What are you looking for? Why can't you just leave me alone?"

He shakes his head and crushes it between his fingers, taking a certain petty satisfaction in feeling each and every component get ground into uselessness. And then he sets what's left on the edge of the roof and blasts it neatly into oblivion, just because it makes him feel better.

He hangs there in the air for a moment afterward, watching a little wisp of smoke swirl away and thinking. The first three times, he thought—coincidence. Maybe some kind of Metropolis PD surveillance operation; or maybe something a little less official than that, something he needed to keep an eye out for, but not necessarily anything he had to worry about for his own sake.

But the first two times had been up at the north end of the bay, the third a little further down—and now he's at almost the other end of the shoreline entirely. Which means either whoever's doing this has their fingers in a whole lot of different pies, or—

Or maybe they're just trying to spread a net as wide as they can, trying to catch something they can't catch any other way.

Like Superman.

He decides to take his time heading back to the Planet, and look around as he goes. Maybe he's being paranoid; maybe he won't find anything. Or maybe—

Or maybe there's going to be a suspicious glint right down the block. Clark draws in a slow breath, lets it out, and goes to take a closer look.

 

 

 

There are more of them. Hundreds, in fact. After the first dozen or so, Clark retreats to a higher altitude and uses his vision to look for them instead. And from up there, he starts to get a sense for how they're spaced, the irregular grid that governs their placement—a little too imperfect to predict precisely, and yet there isn't a single gap in the cameras' coverage.

And together, they span almost a third of Metropolis. It's like a growth, the way the web of them spreads outward from the bay into the city.

The whole thing fills Clark with chilly foreboding, somewhere deep in his gut. Because this is—it really is _planned_ , a clear combination of resources and intent. The Metropolis PD couldn't have set this up, let alone afford this kind of equipment; and the scale is beyond any of the criminal elements in the city that Clark's familiar with.

And maybe he's getting a little too big for his boots, after a year of being Superman full-time, but he—he just can't imagine what it could possibly be about, except him. Someone trying to track his movements, or even catch his face on video clearly enough to identify him, or _something_. Something they're going to keep trying for, or they wouldn't have bothered developing an even subtler version of these things after he found the first three.

Clark rubs a hand across his mouth, and tries to ignore the red tinge developing in the corners of his eyes. He probably should have expected something like this. It was a deliberate decision, after Black Zero, to keep being Superman where people could see him instead of disappearing again. And he doesn't regret it. He wanted to make sure people understood that he—he hadn't meant to cause harm, that he intends to use his abilities to help keep them safe. That he's here to protect Earth, in every way he can. He just—

He just hadn't realized how complicated it would be. The sheer _size_ of Metropolis, the number of things that can go wrong in a day even when there aren't any natural disasters on the other side of the planet. There are so many people who need his help, and he can't do anything but give it—especially here, especially after what Zod and his ship did to this city.

So whoever it is who's doing this, whatever it is they want, he's just going to have to figure out how to deal with it. Superman isn't afraid, and Superman doesn't falter, and that's all there is to it.

 

 

 

Clark destroys one or two more cameras in the same general area as the first, and then goes back to work. He keeps an ear out for anything strange in that direction all day, from his desk and then from the site of an apartment fire, a second and much larger car accident, a near-collision between a couple cargo freighters headed into the port.

But he doesn't catch anything—not until evening.

He gets suited up and then waits in the dark, hovering, the whole city a spangled web of lights spread out beneath him. It's a beautiful night, and he feels his breaths come more easily, tension he hadn't realized he was holding starting to seep from his shoulders.

And then something moves below him.

It takes him a moment to even figure out what drew his eye, what made that particular motion different. Because it isn't any of a million shifting lights; it's the briefest incidental lack of them. Negative space—a silhouette, a slim clean-lined dark shadow interposing itself between Clark and Metropolis. And it's headed right for the blind spot Clark created in the camera net.

Not exactly what Clark was expecting. He watches it for a few more seconds, just to be sure he isn't making things up; and then he swaps over to x-ray and—

Something's wrong. It does have structure, and he can almost pick out the lines of its frame. But the details are—his vision's being obscured. Some kind of coating? Which at least is confirmation that whoever's behind this is interested in Superman, if they've put time and effort into trying to block some of his sensory capabilities.

Great. That's a really reassuring thought.

He drops gradually lower, because who knows what other monitoring devices they've got? He'd rather they didn't notice him until he's had a chance to get a look at them.

Except when that smooth dark thing does ease to a stop, the figure that emerges is covered somehow. Some kind of suit, an odd flowing shadow—a cape? There's something strange about the shape of it, the lines and angles and the top of the head. And whoever they are, the way they move is—Clark has to reach to get even the barest scrape of boot-soles, the whisper of material brushing against itself in motion. Who the hell _is_ this?

And then he catches the tiny dim wink of a reflection: another one of those goddamn cameras. Before he can even second-guess himself, he's diving.

The rush of air must give him away; the shadow on the rooftop has already turned and dropped into a defensive crouch a good half-second before Clark actually lands. And they do seem to have a good grasp of Superman's capabilities, because they don't try to run.

And they don't speak. But then Clark wouldn't necessarily expect someone skulking around the Metropolis skyline at night planting cameras to be the sort of person who's eager to introduce themselves.

"The cameras," Clark says after a moment, when it's clear nothing else will be forthcoming either. "They're yours."

Silence, except for the snap of that long black cape.

"If you were looking for me," Clark adds, "well, here I am," and oh, he shouldn't let that get as sharp as it does. But irritation is burning away dully in the pit of his stomach, a dim red coal, and this is just so— _unfair_. He doesn't even know who this _is_ , and they're still after him, trying to follow him or track him or whatever it is they're hoping for. He doesn't know what, doesn't know why, and it's infuriating that with all the problems he's already taken responsibility for, some stranger should come along and deliberately make another for him.

Still nothing. The figure in front of him could almost be a statue, if the heart and breath and rush of blood weren't so audible to Clark's ears.

"Who are you? What do you want?"

And nothing again. Clark bites off a sigh and props his fists on his hips, trying to look stern and authoritative instead of tired, confused, frustrated.

"Get out of here and take your cameras with you. I'll destroy any I find from now on. Is that clear?"

There, at last: the faintest creak of enamel. Clark's shadowy friend is gritting their teeth.

"I don't answer to you."

The words are clipped, the voice a soft strange growl—surprisingly low, and Clark's never heard anything quite like it before but he almost thinks it's modified. There's a fuzziness to its edges. Like it's layering over itself, just a little: the real voice, barely audible to Clark in the sliver of space between the vocal cords and whatever altered microphone or modulator is involved, and the disguised result.

Clark raises an eyebrow. "You expect me to just let you keep on—"

"Let me," the figure repeats, flat, the words pointed in their lack of inflection.

"You think I couldn't stop you?" Clark forces a mildness he isn't feeling, keeps his tone bland and even.

But this show of restraint doesn't seem to make the figure any more comfortable—the opposite, even, with the crouch going abruptly tighter, tenser, and the silence hanging between them taking on a certain grimness.

Clark didn't come here to start a fight. That's not the point of this. He repeats this to himself once, twice, and then draws a slow breath and says carefully, "Look, whatever it is you're doing, it needs to stop. I don't know why you're watching me, but I'm willing to let it go if you are. Just—leave me alone."

He doesn't wait for the figure to answer—as if there's any reason to think they're going to. He turns away and steps off the edge of the roof, throws himself into what must look like nothing but a vague blue blur to whoever he's leaving behind him.

He's got a couple hundred cameras to collect. And once they're all gone, hopefully that'll serve to underline just how much he meant it. With any luck, his shadowy friend will get the message and slink off to wherever the hell they came from, and Clark will never have to think about them again.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Bruce climbs back into the Batwing with a cold clear focus that's entirely disproportionate to the task, and steadfastly ignores the way his hands are trembling. Adrenaline. It will fade.

Adrenaline—and perhaps a helping of stark fury alongside.

A year's worth of work. Countless hours of strategizing, of design and development, of surveillance. The moment Superman had discovered even a single camera, Bruce should have changed tacks; but he had convinced himself it could be handled. It wasn't necessarily a disaster. Superman still had no idea who was behind it, or even that it had anything to do with him specifically. And Bruce—

Bruce had to do _something_. He _had_ to.

Superman had come out of nowhere. Black Zero had been devastating, unbearable, incomprehensible—and Bruce had had no idea it was coming until it was already too late to do anything about it.

Unacceptable. On every possible level, unacceptable. Bruce has spent a lifetime calibrating everything he touches with sufficient precision to ensure that he is never, ever taken by surprise; above all, the Gotham Bat has survived for as long as it has, has accomplished what it has and yet remained at the level of an unconfirmed rumor, because Bruce is _prepared_. Bruce is always prepared. In situations where any average person might be helpless, Batman remains effective. Otherwise there would be no point.

And Bruce has come to rely on that truth. No matter what the circumstance, to some degree he is always in control. He can hardly remember a time when that wasn't the case

(—except of course he can: a wet dark alley, the impossible loudness of the shots; scattered pearls rolling away, and he hadn't been able to find them all, had still been on his hands and knees looking when the police arrived—)

and it's become as natural to him as breathing; a given, understood.

And then General Zod happened. Black Zero happened. _Superman_ happened, and Bruce had been blindsided, and he'd set everything aside in favor of redressing that sudden feeling of exposure, that critical vulnerability.

And now—what progress can he claim to have made? Yet again, the alien has blown right through whatever flimsy sense of security Bruce might have recouped. No one has _ever_ come so close to the Bat without Bruce intending it; no one's ever _seen_ the Bat without Bruce intending it, let alone stood there and threatened him with a patronizingly impatient expression.

Bruce had known the risk he was running. Superman's frustrated address to the camera had hinted that he might begin putting more effort into determining who'd placed them and why. Bruce had anticipated the possibility of an ambush; it just—

It just hadn't mattered. He's already well aware of how strong the alien is, how fast. Even if he hadn't scraped every recording of the events of Black Zero that he could find, at this point he's got plenty of video footage of his own. He's run simulations, calculations; he's done the math.

But knowing the numbers simply could not have prepared him for the reality. It's down to luck and luck alone that Bruce isn't dead right now, that Alfred isn't at this very moment scraping him off the street somewhere far below the Batwing. If Superman had decided to kill him tonight, there's not a goddamn thing he could have done about it.

He tightens his grip on the Batwing's controls until his knuckles ache. Unacceptable.

And the worst part is that even if he had been able to replace the cameras without interruption, and to continue adding to their number, he's not sure it would have done him any good. He'd hoped that increased coverage might yield results, and he's applied himself to achieving it—but so far the alien's movements have proven incredibly difficult to track. The framerate necessary to detect any sign of him at his usual flight speeds is markedly high, and he's rarely within range for more than a few seconds—he can achieve so much altitude so quickly, g-forces and pressure changes and oxygen content all equally insignificant.

Bruce had thought grimly that he might at least be able to fall back on collating and analyzing the vectors of Superman's arrivals and departures. Assuming, of course, that he could surveil enough of Metropolis to provide him with the necessary data; assuming that it hadn't yet occurred to the alien to put any effort into disguising the directions of his movements—but it was better than nothing, surely.

Except now even that is almost certainly beyond his reach. Superman will be looking for the rest of the cameras, if he hasn't already found them, and said he would destroy them—and Bruce has no reason to doubt it. Which places him, for all intents and purposes, back at square one.

He subvocalized the signal indicating a need for radio silence the moment he'd realized the alien had found him; he doesn't have any solid data regarding Superman's hearing, only conjecture, but the less Superman knows about the Bat's operations, the better.

Superman is gone now, or at least the Batwing's instruments aren't currently detecting him. And the way the alien had turned and flown away—it might have been a ruse. It's possible that he's already doubled back and is trailing Bruce from a distance. But that's only conjecture. It's as safe as it ever might be to give the matching signal indicating resumption of normal operations.

Bruce doesn't bother. He's not particularly interested in unclenching his jaw long enough to do it; and even if he did, he doesn't know what he'd say.

 

 

 

Alfred must realize that operational security is no longer a factor by the time Bruce is nearing the Cave. But he doesn't press, and Bruce returns in unbroken silence.

Until, of course, he's exited the Batwing and shed the suit, at which point he's well aware that Alfred's unlikely to continue to exercise such restraint.

And he's entirely correct. "Ah, Master Wayne," and Alfred's tone is remarkably casual, his attention seemingly fixed fully on the bladed fin of a spare gauntlet—sharpening it, or perhaps just making some adjustment or other. But after a moment his gaze flicks up and finds Bruce; the sensation is comparable, Bruce suspects, to the impact on the husk of a beetle as it's pinned to a mounting card.

Bruce looks away. "You could hear him."

"Yes, I could hear him. I cut my microphone, not my audio feed." Alfred allows a single precise beat of silence, and then sighs. "Sir—"

"Adjustments will have to be made to our strategy," Bruce interrupts. "Passive surveillance is no longer sufficient."

"Passive surveillance is no longer _viable_ , sir," Alfred corrects sharply. "Or did you intend to treat an ultimatum from someone who could kill you onehanded as an optional guideline?"

Bruce clenches his jaw and manages to bite back a snarl. As if he doesn't know how dangerous the alien is, as if he needs to be told—as if that isn't exactly what makes it so important that they succeed in finding _something_ they can use against him. That's why this happened at all, why he kept pushing with the cameras even after Superman discovered the first: because the alien represents so vast and overwhelming a threat that everything Bruce has built, all he has with which to arm and armor himself, dwindles into insignificance in comparison.

"I'm not going to let Superman determine what I do and don't do," he says instead, very evenly. "I won't make my decisions based on his approval or disapproval—"

"And I wouldn't expect it of you," Alfred says to the gauntlet, before sighing again and pressing a thumb tiredly to the bridge of his nose. "I only mean to say that I—worry about you, sir."

Bruce presses his mouth into a line. He's never been particularly good at keeping a grip on his anger in the face of Alfred's earnest concern, however much he wishes it were otherwise. "I'm fine, Alfred," he says after a moment, more quietly.

"Are you?"

Bruce glances up. Alfred's tone was almost pointed—but he's looking Bruce over as if it had been a sincere question, something thoughtful in the furrowing of his brows.

"Having observed that Superman could kill you onehanded," Alfred adds, "and recklessly assuming that your lack of argument constitutes agreement, I must say I can't help but wonder why he didn't."

"Waste of his time," Bruce mutters, sour. Not everyone went to the effort to swat flies. Why bother, when you could leave them to batter themselves to exhaustion against the windowpane?

"Begging your pardon, Master Wayne," Alfred says, "but if efficiency were his primary concern, he needn't have spoken to you at all."

And at that, Bruce can't help but let his mouth twist. Christ, not this conversation again. "I'm not interested in sitting back and relying on Superman's sense of fair play and good will, Alfred—"

"But if there's a chance that he could be reasoned with, sir—"

"—then what?" Bruce says loudly, slamming a hand against the table with a crack. "What? Maybe he'll pinky-swear not to bring down a city? A government? Cross his heart and hope to die, and then we'll still be at his mercy if he should happen to change his mind one day." He shakes his head, punctuational. "No. No. I can't accept that. There has to be some way we can be _sure_. Something this critical, with consequences this severe—we can't leave it to chance. We can't."

Alfred is silent for a moment, and Bruce dares to hope he's managed to make his point in a way that will stick. But then Alfred reaches for the gauntlet again, runs a finger lightly along the gleaming fin-blade, and says, low, "Yes. I suppose it is a little much to ask, that he should believe the best of us when we refuse to do the same for him. You cannot bring yourself to stay your hand—why then should he?"

Bruce sighs sharply through his nose and turns away. Enough. Alfred should know better than to try to change Bruce's mind about a thing like this. "I'll be down on the lower level if you need me," he says. Even if Superman is at this very moment systematically frying every camera Bruce set up, he can at least review today's footage for anything that might be useful.

"As you say, sir," Alfred murmurs behind him, and Bruce walks away without looking back.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

"—and it turned out he was the one who'd been putting up all the cameras—"

"Wait a second," Lois says, holding up a hand. "Hang on, back up. You said this guy was dressed all in black?"

Clark blinks at her. "Yeah."

"And there was something weird about his head."

"Yeah," Clark agrees. "He had this helmet, or—cowl, or something. I don't know exactly what it was. But it had ears on it. Or horns, maybe."

And it sounds kind of stupid when he says it out loud, which isn't right. It hadn't _looked_ stupid. Maybe the black suit, the cape, the dark of night, had helped with that; somehow it had been unsettling instead, the strange shape to the head. Like he hadn't been facing a person in a helmet so much as a gargoyle, a creature. Something just a little elemental, the barest critical fraction larger than life.

But Lois doesn't laugh. Her eyebrows jump, and then she looks at him sharply for a second, like she thinks there's a chance he's about to grin and say _Gotcha!_

He stares at her blankly instead, and that just makes her eyebrows climb even higher.

"Huh," she says. "I'll be damned."

"What?" It doesn't make any sense, but the only guess Clark can venture is— "You know him?"

"No, of course not," she says, and then, with a grin, "I haven't made a habit out of befriending guys who like to spend their spare time hanging out on roofs wearing capes, Clark. You're the exception, not the rule."

Clark rolls his eyes, but he can feel the corner of his mouth twitching up.

"No, I don't know him," Lois repeats, more slowly. "But it sounds like—"

She's interrupted by a phone ringing; and it wouldn't matter except that it's the one right by her hip, which is her desk phone.

She cranes her head around to read the caller ID, and then her eyes widen and she slides off the desk to her feet. "Mayor's office—I'd better take this," she says, already reaching for the handset and making an apologetic little face.

Clark raises his hands, accepting, and backs away toward his own desk. He'd gotten sidetracked, telling Lois all about his encounter with the Creepy Cameraman—half the office has stepped out at the same time, and he hadn't wanted to miss his chance to bring it up while there was nobody close enough to hear. But Perry's going to get after him if he doesn't have a draft of this school attendance piece by this afternoon—

Lois's hand comes up, sudden pale flash of her palm in his peripheral vision, and he stops short. For a moment nothing happens; her gaze is still off in the middle distance, mouth pinched in concentration. But then she looks at Clark and dips her chin in the tiniest little nod.

Ah. One of those calls.

Clark manages not to heave a sigh. Ever since Lois went to break her alien story with Woodburn, and General Zod showed up right after—and then she'd disappeared with the military, and come right back in the middle of Metropolis with Superman, and, well. It would be asking a lot to expect everybody to take two and two and pretend it didn't make four.

Which means anyone who's serious about getting in touch with Superman calls Lois Lane, these days. And Lois has a great game face; Clark can't count the number of times he's listened to her calmly tell somebody she's afraid she can't help them, so sorry, right before she hangs up.

But every now and then it's somebody worth listening to. And it's the mayor's office, this time—what could they possibly want with him?

"Yes," Lois says into the phone, "yes, of course," but Clark waits for her to meet his eyes again, tap the phone and then her free ear to ask him to listen in, before he opens up far enough to catch the voice on the other end of the line.

"—will be hosting a commemorative gala on the anniversary?"

"Yes, I've heard," Lois agrees. "Cat Grant will be handling our coverage, I believe."

"Of course," says the voice—the mayor's aide, Clark thinks, because he's pretty sure he can hear the mayor even further in the background, partway through a meeting. "I'm calling because the mayor's office would like to extend an invitation to—well, to you, of course, Ms. Lane. And on the behalf of the city of Metropolis, to Superman, as our guest of honor."

"I see," Lois says carefully.

She's still watching Clark, and her expression is almost neutral; except her eyes are just a little too wide, concerned.

Clark swallows and looks away.

"I appreciate your call," he hears Lois say, as if from far away. "Could I call you back at this number to confirm?"

"Of course," the mayor's aide says, and then half a dozen more polite pleasantries that slide past Clark like white noise, and then all at once he's jerked back by the decisive clunk of Lois hanging up.

"Clark—"

"I'm fine," Clark says automatically. And then, belatedly, "Yes."

"Yes," Lois repeats gently, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes, I'll go. I mean—Superman will."

"You don't have to."

She's crossed the space between their desks in a few quick steps, and her tone is soft, careful. After a second she lays one hand carefully over the back of Clark's—on the edge of his desk, and he can hear something cracking somewhere—

Oh. Huh. He hadn't realized he'd been gripping the desk quite that hard.

"It's fine," he tells Lois's wrist, staring down at it blankly. "It's about Black Zero. Right? The anniversary. That's what she said."

"Yeah," Lois says, and then, more quietly, "Doesn't feel like a year, does it?"

Clark doesn't answer. He doesn't know how to. It feels like a lifetime ago; it feels like it was yesterday. He can, dimly, if he tries, remember what it had been like to be a version of himself Black Zero hadn't happened to—but the distance between him and that Clark is incomprehensible, uncrossable.

He'd known, afterward. Kneeling there with Zod's body, Lois's footsteps in the distance drawing closer, staring down at his shaking hands; he'd known nothing would ever be the same.

And there wasn't any going back—only forward. He'd known that, too, and he'd known there was nothing he could do about it but come to terms with it.

He's Superman. He does his best. That's all that matters now.

"They're probably hoping to reframe the narrative a little," Lois is saying thoughtfully. "Now that it's been a while, and everybody knows you're sticking around."

Clark looks away. "Sticking around," he repeats.

"You know," Lois says. "In Metropolis. Clark—" and then she stops and Clark can practically feel the way her gaze softens, and can definitely hear her sigh, right before she leans in to squeeze his shoulder. "Clark. People didn't know what was going to happen after Black Zero. They didn't know what to think. No one was expecting you, and no one knew whether you were going to stay, or go, or—I don't know, build yourself a vacation home on the moon—"

Clark snorts, helpless, and looks up; Lois grins back at him for a second, and then her expression turns sober, sweet, a little sorry.

"I know you've been doing your best to help us, since Black Zero," she says quietly. "You've been doing your best to help everyone. You've saved a lot of lives and done a lot of good, and I know there are a lot of things you feel like nobody else can do—"

"Nobody else _can_ do them, Lo," Clark interrupts, shaking his head. "If I don't, there's no one. I have to. That's all there is to it."

"Okay," Lois says, tone even—acknowledging, Clark thinks, but not agreeing. "I just don't want you thinking it's your fault. All right? Some people still don't know what to think of Superman, but it's not because you aren't trying hard enough."

"Isn't it?"

" _No_. Clark, Black Zero was huge and frightening and confusing, and three-quarters of the context people need to understand it is still classified." She squeezes his shoulder again, and doesn't ease off until he gives in and meets her eyes again. "Almost nobody really knows what happened. And the US military might owe them an explanation, but you don't.

"You saved the world. You don't have anything to make up for. And if you don't want to go to this gala—"

"No," Clark says instantly, shaking his head. "No, I—it's important. It's the city's way of acknowledging everyone who died, honoring them. Superman should be there. It's fine."

And Lois looks at him for a long moment like she's the one with x-ray vision: like she can see right through him. But all she does, in the end, is tighten her grip on his shoulder one more time and say, "All right. I'll call the mayor's office back and let them know."

"Okay. Thanks," Clark adds, and reaches up to squeeze her hand right back. And then, finally, he can move away, put his desk between himself and that knowing stare, and get back to work.

 

 

 

He ducks out of the office at the end of the day with a guilty sense of relief. Usually he likes being at the Planet, likes being so aggressively ordinary; usually it's nice to have somewhere where he's so definitively _not_ Superman.

But Lois's concerned gaze kept catching on him all afternoon, absent, in the brief moments when she hadn't been in the middle of anything pressing. And it added up, cumulative, to a weight Clark's glad to get out from underneath.

And when he does leave, he knows exactly where he's headed.

It's almost funny. A year ago, he'd have done anything to stay away from Heroes Park; he'd avoided it, hadn't wanted to have anything to do with it. He'd told himself it was just practical: Clark Kent shouldn't show too much interest in Kryptonian things, shouldn't get caught poking around in the rubble or hanging around the crashed scout ship.

But after a while, he'd found himself almost eager to go back. Just to make sure everything was all right, that nothing had gone wrong with the ship. There had still been a perimeter established, security for the research installation—there still is now. But of course Clark could get in and out in the blink of an eye with no trouble, and then he'd discovered the ship was still working.

Not well. Or at least it hadn't been, six months ago. He's managed to get it to tell him what he can do for it, how to help it start to repair itself, and more and more of its systems have started coming back online. And it's—it's surprisingly useful. It knows things; it has sensors, it can keep track of things on the other side of the world, follow up with forecasts and update him about half a dozen situations at once in real time. And—

And he likes it. The ship itself, and being inside it—it knows who he is, what he can do, and he doesn't have to worry about using his powers or who can see him or whether to lie. It's Kryptonian, but not in a way where he needs to worry about it getting delusions of grandeur and trying to reshape Earth; it traveled a long way to get here, and it can't get back, and nobody will leave it alone now that they know it's here. And Black Zero broke it, it's banged up and busted open and it's got some holes in it, but it's getting better. Clark is helping it get better—no timetable, nobody's life on the line, just—helping.

Plus he's starting to think maybe it likes him, too.

"Okay, how about now?" he calls out.

"Secondary data drive inoperable," the ship says, not unkindly.

Clark stares up into the gap behind the wall—bulkhead? Hull? He's really not qualified for this—and sighs. As far as he can tell, Kryptonian technology operates mostly on principles involving smooth shimmery trails of gleaming motes, lots of tiny pieces aligning and dealigning and realigning. He can _see_ the secondary data drive, or at least he's pretty sure that's what this glittering knot of light is. But it's as big around as a hula hoop and there are at least a dozen strands of _something_ holding it suspended that look oddly dull, dark.

He closes his eyes and settles his hand against the wall. He's learned that there aren't really controls, as such. He can reach out anywhere and something will form up helpfully under his fingertips, contact points that seem to function as a group. He doesn't have to type or press, it's more abstract than that: there's a representation in his head that gets clearer every time he does this, and he's pretty sure it's the ship putting it there. He wouldn't be able to keep track of that many drifting flows of light on his own.

And they used to just slip through his fingers, so to speak, but he's gotten better and better at manipulating them, at understanding how he can move them and cross them and rearrange them. He works his way carefully through half a dozen configurations, trial and error, cracking an eye now and then to see whether anything's changed—and then the seventh time, something has. Something's lit up that wasn't before.

"Ship?"

"Secondary data drive inoperable," the ship repeats. But then it adds slowly, "Data cache specifications detected."

Clark swallows hard. "Is the backup intact? Did it cache the projection program?"

"Unknown."

Right. Right, okay, because who knows what _data cache specifications_ might mean? Still, it can't be a bad sign. "But there is data on it?" Clark says. "You just don't know what?"

"Confirmed. Chances of successful data recovery now twenty-nine percent."

Clark blinks. "What were they to start with?"

"Eleven percent."

Clark aims a narrow-eyed glance up at the ceiling. "I'm not sure whether that makes me feel better or worse. You really didn't expect me to be able to figure this out, huh?"

The ship is silent for a moment. And then it says quietly, "The initial calculation was done during assessments immediately following the damage incurred. Whether you would return and assist was at that time unknown."

"Oh." Clark hesitates, and then, on a whim, smooths his hand away from the control contacts and along the wall. "Well. Here I am."

"Yes," the ship agrees, and Clark's probably kidding himself, but its tone sounds pleased to him, maybe even a little smug.

He works for maybe another half an hour, but doesn't stumble across any other particularly fruitful arrangements of light. It doesn't help that his concentration keeps straying, and after the third or fourth time he tries to push the same light-strand into a position it really doesn't want to be in, he decides to take a break.

He walks back through the ship, trailing his hands idly along its walls, until he reaches the central room—or at least that's how he thinks of it, though he doesn't know whether that reflects any use it might actually have had. It's the room where Jor-El—the projection of Jor-El, that is—had explained to him about Krypton, the ship, everything. He'd come back afterward a couple of times with more questions, to the same room, and it had started to feel comfortably familiar.

And Jor-El isn't there anymore, but Clark still likes to go there. It still makes him think of the first time, of finally being handed the answers to questions he'd thought he'd never be able to ask.

He stands in the entryway for a moment, just looking at it. And then he walks in and sits on the floor—which flexes a little underneath him, accommodating. He can't get the thought of the gala out of his head. That's the problem.

The gala, and everything Lois said, Black Zero and Metropolis and the way people see Superman, all tangled up in one big ugly knot. And it's ridiculous, but the thing he keeps circling back to is—

What the hell is he going to _wear_?

Maybe because it's basically the smallest problem he's got right now—or at least the one he's the most likely to be able to solve. It _does_ matter: it's not like he can show up dressed like Clark Kent, but he wears the uniform every time people see him as Superman. The gala's going to be a special occasion.

And he was wearing the uniform during Black Zero. He should—he should probably try to come up with something else.

Besides, it would be a good idea for other reasons. Wouldn't it? If Superman has formal clothes of his own, he looks—well, he looks less like Clark Kent, for one thing, but he also looks more like his own person. Like someone who's living his own distinctly alien life as something other than a reporter, deliberately making the time to help people, instead of some kind of anomaly that pops up when there's a crisis and then vanishes again.

He angles a glance up at the ceiling. "Ship, that pod where my uniform was stored—was it here the whole time? Were there members of the House of El on your crew?"

"There were," the ship confirms. "Fabrication pods may be used for storage as needed; however—"

"Fabrication?" Clark interrupts. "So you can make things in them, then."

"Yes."

"Out of the same material?"

"Any material with specifications accessible in operating databanks may be generated in fabrication pods."

"And—designs?"

He feels kind of sheepish for asking; but the ship seems to take it as a perfectly normal database query. "From which era of Kryptonian civilization?"

Clark blinks. "How many eras are there?"

"Per the most recent databank update transmission in system logs, Kryptonian scholars were generally agreed upon forty-nine, with some restricting the number to as few as thirty-three and others placing the total as high as fifty-six—"

And Clark supposes that shouldn't be a surprise. What had Jor-El said? _For a hundred thousand years, our civilization flourished—_

"How about you, uh. Pick something random from one of the early ones? Let's say the first fifteen," Clark ventures. He's learned that it's a good idea to give the ship a few parameters to work with, even when he doesn't know enough about what he's asking to be specific.

The floor wavers a little in front of him, and then all at once changes: the smooth interlocking pieces that make it up shift and surge and rise, and form themselves gracefully into a figure. A Kryptonian, his face probably a composite formed by combining some batch of records the ship has, and he's wearing something long and flowing, seemingly fastened by circlets around his upper arms, his throat—and it layers in a way Clark can't quite figure out, tucked and folded, an overskirt splitting to show an underskirt and some kind of pleating involved at the waist.

Not that it doesn't look comfortable, but Clark's not entirely sure he'd be able to put that on without strangling himself. Plus there's a kind of hat-thing that, uh. "Top hat" isn't right, "hennin" isn't right, but he's not sure there's a word for something that's doing its best to split the difference. And Statue Guy is pulling it off okay, that distant dignified expression managing to assert that if you had any sense you'd get your own brimmed mini-hennin, but Clark's not sure he himself is up to it.

"Um, let's try something from one of the next ten?" he says, and can't quite stop staring at the hat, transfixed, until it melts away.

And then he blinks. Apparently Krypton went through a pretty conservative phase at some point, because this guy is buttoned up all the way to his ears, just about. This time the skirt's got more of a severe business aesthetic, pencil-style but all the way to the ankles, and Clark suspects there might be another, or maybe a slim pair of slacks, underneath it. Sleeves to the wrists, a strip of heavy tight fastenings along the front of the jacket, and the collar goes right up to the chin, straight except where it flares to follow the line of the throat.

There's a hint of style in the lines of it—the ship made it fit Statue Guy perfectly, and he looks sort of sweepingly intimidating in it. But if Clark put it on, he suspects he'd mostly look uncomfortable. And then he'd _be_ uncomfortable, after about half an hour.

"Next ten, please," he tells the ship diplomatically, and the new suit melts obediently away and is replaced by—

Clark almost swallows his tongue.

That hypothetical conservative phase apparently was followed by the pendulum swinging in the opposite direction.

 _Far_ in the opposite direction.

The one piece of fabric Clark can see is—well-tailored. Highly-embroidered, or at least some kind of fantastically complex and flowing pattern is decorating it somehow. That's nice, he thinks distantly.

"So Kryptonian ideas about how much nudity was _nudity_ —um, varied, over time."

"The development of the technologies that would be refined into the Codex system altered cultural taboos relating to sexual reproduction," the ship agrees placidly. "Primary and secondary sexual characteristics were gradually treated as less and less distinct from any other part of the body—"

"Okay," Clark says, keeping his eyes trained carefully above Statue Guy's waist. He doesn't really want to know exactly how anatomically correct the ship decided to make its model. If nothing else, it seems a little disrespectful toward whatever long-dead Kryptonian provided the inspiration. Even if that long-dead Kryptonian might not have minded all that much. "Well, I definitely can't wear that in public on this particular planet."

And maybe he's making this more complicated than it needs to be. When he'd first found the ship, figured out what he could do with it—the projection it had created of Jor-El had been wearing clothes. Clark hadn't paid them any particular attention, not next to everything Jor-El had been telling him and showing him. But that meant they hadn't demanded it. Which, he definitely would've noticed if Jor-El had been wearing something like, uh, this.

"How about something from the most recent era? The, um—my father, what he programmed himself wearing. Do you remember that?"

"While projection data is no longer accessible, internal sensor records should suffice," the ship agrees, and in the space of a breath Statue Guy's non-clothing has reformed across his figure into something that does look kind of familiar. The panels across the chest, the contoured collar; the single broad slash in each sleeve of the jacket, curving into the cuffs at the wrists.

Definitely better. Clark eyes it for a minute, thoughtful, and then rolls to his feet to inspect it more carefully. The more he thinks about it, the more he likes the idea—not just something Kryptonian but something Jor-El wore. Because in its own way, Superman was his dream more than anyone else's: a Kryptonian who'd learn to love Earth, who'd understand what was best and most beautiful about it, who would defend it no matter the cost. It seems right that he should be there, at a gala honoring Superman, even if nobody's going to know it but Clark.

"Okay," Clark says. "That might work. Can you—change it a little, though?"

"Certainly. Please describe the modifications you require."

Clark hesitates. "Could you compare it to the database? Is there anything similar in there?"

A moment, and then graceful additions trace themselves out across the surface. Armor, almost, or something like it: pauldrons, on the shoulders, and something that's almost a chestplate, and the cuffs of the sleeves look abruptly more like gauntlets than before, though whether they've actually changed or it's just Clark's impression of them that's different, Clark isn't sure. And then it keeps going, the panels across the chest altering, the whole cut of the outer robe changing—

"No, no, stop," Clark says, and the transformation obediently halts. "Go back a little bit. Keep the shoulders, that's fine, but—yes, perfect. The chestplate and the shoulders, those should have the House of El insignia, right?"

"Records indicate it would not be out of place," the ship agrees, and in an instant the intricate twining curves of Kryptonian heraldry are shaping themselves out of nothing.

"And—could it be red?"

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Bruce examines the latest design render with a critical eye, and then brushes a finger against the touchscreen to rotate it. He won't bother with a 3D wireframe projection until he's settled on a basic outline that satisfies him.

Not that satisfaction in this particular respect is all that likely. He's been meaning to upgrade the basic design for the suit's armor plates for a while—more MR fluid, less Kevlar plating, because the liquid armor formula is so much easier to improve and test, and the gains in flexibility and movement speed really are dramatic. But—

But every time he looks at the numbers, he can feel his lip curl.

As if it matters. As if eight percent here, eleven percent there, a distinctly increased ability to withstand both acceleration and impact, means a goddamn thing except that it might take the alien a nanosecond longer to kill him. In the next five minutes, Superman could blow a hole through the ground right into the Batcave, drag Bruce out, and twist his head off like a bottlecap. What could stop him? What kind of countermeasure could possibly be developed that's even remotely capable of containing that kind of power?

Bruce sighs, sharp, through his nose, and spins the render the other direction. He's never liked questions he doesn't know the answers to. And this one is suffocatingly unignorable. The urgency of it is relentless, pressing in on him from every direction; that was true even before Superman had become aware of Bruce's efforts, and now it's truer still. It's been nearly a year, and there's—there's still so much he doesn't know, it's staggering.

Bruce can't even be certain he understands the full depth and breadth of everything the alien is capable of. Since Black Zero, Superman has intervened in dozens of incidents all around the world, from natural disasters to hostage situations, bank robberies to suicide bombings. A core set of commonly-used powers was easy to tally up—the speed, the strength, the invulnerability, the flight—and yet the evidence suggests a grab-bag of less obvious abilities. Superman clearly has _some_ kind of long-distance sensory capability, though whether it's hearing, sight, or both is difficult to pin down. Or, of course, it could be some kind of mental extension; and if the alien has the ability to touch human minds, to perceive what they perceive—who's to say he can't exert his will upon them? Why should he draw a line between suggestion and compulsion?

But there isn't any evidence for or against. Not yet.

Bruce has wrestled with the urge to catastrophize; Superman may be the stuff of nightmares, but despair is hardly a productive reaction. After the first six months, he had even felt able to tentatively downgrade the risk of invasion. In all the footage he'd been able to secure, the number of distinctly identifiable alien individuals had never exceeded half a dozen. Evidently a scouting team of some kind, but their attempts to alter the planet to suit their needs had failed—and in that case, surely it's reasonable to assume that no colonization effort will be forthcoming. Not until after another team has been sent and has succeeded, at least.

And the first had failed because Superman had opposed them. Bruce just doesn't know _why_. What does the alien hope to get out of it? What are his intentions? It's easy enough to extrapolate the broad strokes: on a world populated by his own kind, Superman would hardly be pre-eminent; but on Earth, and an Earth where his capabilities are unmatched, whatever he pleases is his for the taking. Surely it's only a matter of time before he makes his move—but that's where the details become increasingly crucial. Without some way to clarify his motives, his interests, his desires, all Bruce can do is guess.

And with the fate of the world on the line, guessing isn't good enough. Bruce can't counter an enemy he can't predict; and whether Superman intends to set himself up as some kind of god-king or is content to hold world governments hostage behind the scenes, _someone_ has to be prepared. Someone has to be ready to do what's necessary to bring him down.

Bruce stares at the screen, and then adjusts the render settings to generate a smoother line. With as little information as he has—who knows? Maybe the upgrades will be worth it after all. Maybe a nanosecond just before his own death is exactly what Bruce will need.

There's no telling just yet, and he can't afford to count anything out.

 

 

 

The sun is rising somewhere over the lake, by the time the newest designs are ready for trial fabrication.

Bruce can't see it, obviously; but Alfred mentions as much, with a certain acrid pointedness, when he comes downstairs. Bruce absently accepts the cup of coffee and ignores the buttered toast and the commentary in equal measure.

He takes a sip, and idly adjusts his system settings off of what Alfred likes to call Archimedes-in-a-bathtub mode—now that he's no longer actively at work on a high-priority project, there's no need to suppress lower-level notifications and alerts.

A digest of everything that's been held back in the intervening hours pops up, and he flicks through its contents, most of his attention admittedly directed toward the coffee, the way it feels to take that first smooth dark swallow. A few developments he'll be checking out on his next patrol night, a tip from the ever-generous Gordon, a couple social media flags, and—

Bruce doesn't jerk or startle. He finishes swallowing, sets the coffee carefully on the desk, and only then clicks through.

He scrapes for every mention of Superman he can find, every hashtag, every blurry photo and argumentative comment ("that's a bird, dude" "NO IT'S AN AIRPLANE ARE YOU BLIND" "i tagged it #superman for a reason ok i know what i saw!!!!"). But there's a lot of it, and at least three-quarters is bullshit; he developed an algorithm, set up a utility to run it all through, and only Priority 3 and above get redirected anywhere where he can see them.

But this is Priority 1—confirmed sightings, local, in which Batman might be able to intervene. And there aren't a lot of Priority 1s. Usually Superman leaves the scene much too quickly for Bruce to be anything but too late.

Then again, this isn't a situation Bruce had anticipated.

— _pleased to confirm the attendance of our guests of honor (Loreena Davitz, Raul Garza, and Superman) at the First Annual Metropolis City Memorial Gala_ —

Confirmed sighting; local; and Bruce has more than enough time to intervene, given that the gala is more than a week away.

"Sir? Sir."

Bruce glances up. Alfred is watching him, eyebrows raised.

"Something of interest, sir?"

"An opportunity," Bruce says briskly, looking back at the screen. The more he considers the idea, the more perfect it seems. Batman has been trying for nearly a year to get close enough to observe Superman properly, and has only managed to find himself caught out, exposed, with nothing whatsoever to show for it. But Bruce Wayne—

Batman has no real hope of defeating Superman in combat—not yet, at least. But Bruce Wayne won't have to. Bruce Wayne will be just another civilian at a party, and the alien has absolutely no reason to be suspicious of him. And Wayne has made appearances at things like this before, if only because his PR people have told him to. Besides, after what happened to the Wayne Enterprises financial tower in Metropolis on Black Zero, Wayne's as likely to pop up at this kind of event as any actual Metropolis citizen.

He's already turning over the options in his mind. There has to be some kind of way to secure a miniature scanner or sensor on Bruce Wayne's person—disguised by a tie pin or a cufflink, even, so whatever additional senses the alien has are less likely to discern it. He should be able to reach very close range, this way; what better opportunity is he ever going to have to take detailed readings of Superman? _Anything_ that can give him a useful hint as to the mechanisms underlying the alien's biology would be welcome, at this point—

"I assume it's already pointless to try to talk you out of this," Alfred is saying with a sigh, over Bruce's shoulder.

"Yes," Bruce says, without looking away from the screen. "For once, we know exactly where Superman is going to be and when, and I'll have an opportunity to approach him without putting him on his guard. I'm not going to pass that up."

"And if he realizes why you're there? Or who you are? Depending on exactly how enhanced his senses are, there are a dozen ways he might recognize you, sir, despite every precaution we take—"

"He can hardly murder Bruce Wayne in front of a roomful of the most important people in the metro area," Bruce says. "And if he does—"

He cuts himself off, a little too late. The point is salient: _even that will work to our advantage_ , he would have said, _if his true nature is exposed to the world by it_.

But Alfred doesn't like it when Bruce talks about those kinds of hypotheticals too much.

He risks a glance, and yes, there's the grim and disapproving stare he was expecting. "I'm sure you know what you're doing, sir," Alfred murmurs, in a tone that says he's sure of nothing of the kind—but he opens the door, and he can't blame Bruce for stepping through it.

"I do, Alfred, thank you," Bruce says evenly, and then turns back to the monitors. He's got work to do, and it's important; and Alfred does understand that, however much he might imply otherwise. Alfred will forgive him, in time, and right now he has a gala appearance to plan.

 

 


	2. Be the first to extend your hand.

 

 

**Be the first to extend your hand.**

_This makes a strong, lasting impression on the person at the receiving end. It's also about control: by offering your hand first, you're leading the way. (The only time you shouldn't seek to offer to shake first is when there's an authority structure in place to adhere to. If there's a more senior or higher-ranked person at a social gathering or in a work or business context, it's important to demonstrate a willingness to follow their lead instead!)_

 

The First Annual Metropolis City Memorial Gala is held in the Padovano Building on Bessolo Boulevard—one of those huge old architectural artifacts with all the works, wide marble steps and columns, pediment sculptures casting their distant gazes out across all the sleek black cars and steadfastly ignoring the pigeons cooing at their feet.

Bruce Wayne flicks a bored glance across the façade and steps out of his limo, offering a lukewarm smile to someone whose face he doesn't seem quite able to put a name to, though he still says, "Hi, hey, good to see you," in a vague friendly way. He claps a couple people on the back, makes a reference to not having had anything better to do without, apparently, realizing how that sounds. All told, before he's even set foot inside, the prevailing opinion is established: someone on Wayne's poor beleaguered PR team managed to talk him into this, and by the time he realized there might not be all that much booze here, they'd already gotten him into the car.

And then Bruce goes in, and almost can't hang onto the pretense in the face of the knowledge that he's in the same building as the alien. He's not even sure whether the tension ratcheting itself up along the line of his spine is down to anger

(all this, this beautiful building and all these people putting their time and money and effort forward in _honor_ of the creature that _caused_ all this; smiling and nodding and mouthing polite platitudes at that _thing_ )

or sheer animal awareness that he's sharing space with something presumably both willing and able to snap his neck.

Whatever it is, it makes playacting his way through Bruce Wayne's usual rigmarole feel not only tiring—as it has a little too often, lately—but irrelevant. Usually he's better at this when Bruce Wayne has been pulled out for the sake of a mission, instead of just to keep up appearances; when he's doing this to accomplish something that matters. But this mission in particular casts such a looming shadow that engaging in Bruce Wayne's usual flippant frippery seems farcical, nonsensical.

He does catch himself before he can glare at the woman who steps forward to greet him at the entrance to the main room. That's an appropriate reaction for Batman, getting interrupted in the middle of something important—but not for Bruce Wayne.

And she's the mayor's aide; she smiles at him warmly and thanks him for his generous donation to the city's Black Zero fund, so she must have done her homework. He waves off her gratitude, makes sure his reply nudges across the line between polite and self-importantly pompous, and then sidles away.

On the pretext of wandering across the room to grab himself a flute of something bubbly, he does a quick sweep of the room. The alien isn't immediately obvious; but it's an enormous room, and Bruce Wayne isn't fashionably late so much as actually late, so it's nearly at capacity. He brushes past two other people Bruce Wayne has to wave at and an unfamiliar woman in green and gold before he reaches a table of refreshments, can grab a drink and then turn, taking a sip and surveying the room again through the curve of the glass.

Still nothing.

Bruce bites the inside of his cheek in a burst of sharp frustration. He's not in the mood to gladhand his way through this entire goddamn party.

But the mission is what matters, not what he's in the mood for; and if that's what it takes, then that's what it takes.

He lowers his glass, wipes his mouth indecorously on the back of one hand, and then waves at a business acquaintance. He lets himself glance around the room one more time, just in case, and this time his gaze does catch on a dark head of hair—but it's not right, he thinks, and moves on, automatic.

And then he realizes his mistake, and looks back.

He'd imposed limitations without realizing it: he'd been checking for that uniform, the glimmering tessellated blue and the stark simple S-shape blocked out across the chest. But that's not what the alien is wearing tonight.

For an instant, paranoid though it might be, he almost thinks he's been found out, that Superman suspects something: the shoulders and chest look like metal, like armor, and Bruce finds himself immediately contemplating the breadth of the enormous windows on the strength of the possibility that he'll need an escape route.

But it stops at the chest—and it's so ornate, something tangling and organic about the design, that on second glance it doesn't look nearly as functional as it had at first. And the rest of it is all cloth, form-fitting except where the sleeves sweep out along the forearms, where the skirt of the robe splits neatly to curve toward the hem. Red, edged in the same metallic color as the not-quite-armor. No hint of the uniform at all, in fact, except in the dark blue peeking out from the artful slashes down the sleeves.

And it does—it does look different. It makes _him_ look different. His expression is as composed as ever; every glimpse Bruce has ever gotten of Superman's face, smartphone video or news footage or half-blurred photographs, and he always has the same distant look of generalized benevolence. The effect's only enhanced by the part where the alien's so often in the air, already half-gone, looking down on every awestruck lens from above.

But now he's on ground level, greeting every individual person who approaches him with grave courtesy, a brief soft smile, eye contact. The staff from the Metropolis mayor's office seems to have planned for this, intervening and steering people away every time there's any danger of a crush forming around him, and so what there is of a line toward him is moving easily; he pays everyone precisely the same amount of attention, unfaltering.

And they're all falling for it, Bruce thinks distantly. He's—he moved, though he can't quite remember doing it, and he's close enough to hear them now, their greetings and compliments and soft shy words. Because the alien looks _real_ , like this: dressed up in what's presumably his planet's idea of a three-piece suit and tie, next to the emergency services worker and Black Zero survivor who are the other two guests of honor, with a dark curl flipped down over his forehead, close enough to touch.

As if he deserves to be here—as if he isn't why Loreena Davitz spent seventy-eight straight hours running an impromptu triage center in the middle of Fifth Avenue, the reason Raul Garza was trapped in a half-collapsed lobby with forty-three other people he helped keep calm and stable and breathing until someone could get them out. Bruce can understand why the invitation was issued; given that Superman seems to have chosen Metropolis for a home base and doesn't appear inclined to leave, why should the city government risk his anger? Why not choose to signal their willingness to brush all that ugliness under the rug? But that Superman accepted it—

That Superman accepted it, Bruce can neither understand nor forgive.

The alien smiles that careful little smile, claps a hand gently against someone's shoulder, and then suddenly that inscrutable blue gaze is aimed directly at Bruce.

Because—because for a moment, the line of admirers has run out, and Bruce's feet have been carrying him inexorably in Superman's direction.

Bruce Wayne isn't someone who's given the broader implications of Black Zero or Superman a second thought. And for all that the alien _has_ done, none of it was tonight; he hasn't knocked this building down, hasn't left them all to die in its rubble.

(Yet.)

Bruce can't justify overt hostility, can't spit in the marble perfection of that face. No matter how much he wants to.

And yet he can't bring himself to pin on Bruce Wayne's simpering smile, either. He stands there, one hand in his pocket and the other carefully loose around his champagne; crushing the glass in his hand would draw all the wrong kinds of attention.

And Superman stands there looking back at him, expression mild and pleasant, and then reaches out.

"Bruce Wayne, right?"

Bruce feels his jaw knot itself up helplessly, just hearing his name come out of that mouth. But he can't cause a scene, not now; he can't afford to break his knuckles on that cheekbone, can't pry apart that alien armor with his fingertips, can't force Superman to kill him in front of all these people.

He clears his throat instead, which is all it should take to activate the paired scanners in his collar pin. "So you've heard of me," he manages.

He can't quite strike the right tone—it's not nearly light enough, much too barbed at the point. But Superman doesn't seem to notice, or if he does it doesn't bother him. He just tilts his head a little, expression politely amiable, [and he's still holding out his goddamn hand even though Bruce hasn't made a single move to take it](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14505618).

"You were very generous to the repair fund, I understand," Superman says. "That was kind."

Bruce huffs a sharp breath through his nose, and there's nothing for it: he draws his free hand grudgingly from his pocket. "So you haven't heard that much of me," he revises aloud, because _kind_ is hardly the word that would spring to most people's minds to describe Bruce Wayne, and then he has time enough to steel himself before their hands touch.

He doesn't know what he was expecting. For the alien to feel the way he looks, coolly perfect, unassailable, invulnerable. But Superman's hand feels like anyone's; his fingers are warm, his grip firm but not uncomfortable.

Not that it matters. It's far, far too late for Bruce to be fooled.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Clark blinks, a little wrongfooted. Wayne is insulting—himself? "It was kind," he repeats anyway. "Thank you."

Wayne stares at him, and for a moment there's—there's something so dourly disbelieving, almost contemptuous, in his face, his eyes, the angle of his brow, that Clark feels abruptly defensive.

"Not that I speak for the city in any respect," he says, trying to keep his tone calm and friendly. "I just wanted to express my appreciation for your generosity."

"Yeah," Wayne says, "well," and then he seems to realize his hand is still in Clark's—whoops—and jerks it free, a sudden spasmodic movement that turns into an offhanded wave of his fingers in midair. "I'll pass it on to my accountant's office—they're the ones I'm paying to maximize my tax deduction." And for the first time, Wayne smiles, the briefest dim flicker at one corner of that wryly slanting mouth.

And jesus, what the hell kind of thing is that to say? Clark's frowning before he can stop himself; he does his best to mask his distaste before it can get too obvious, but the sharpness of Wayne's gaze says he didn't miss it. And—fine, Clark can't help thinking. Good. Serves him right. Where does he get off talking about Black Zero like what mattered was the chance at a tax break?

But whatever his reasoning was, he did give an awful lot of money, and it had been used to help an awful lot of people. That's what matters most. Clark reminds himself of that, takes a deep breath, and pastes Superman's pleasantly genial smile back on.

"I'm sure I can count on you to convey my gratitude to whichever parties might deserve it," and that still came out sharper than it should have, but the mocking edge on Wayne's grin suggests his feelings aren't hurt too badly.

"Oh, I don't know about that," Wayne drawls. "I'm not a real dependable guy. We can't all be superheroes."

As if it were that simple. As if Clark has any idea what he's doing, as if he isn't constantly stumbling, as if he hasn't spent the last year scrabbling for steady ground and not finding it—

As if he can say any of that to Wayne.

Clark forces his smile a little wider instead, and then says blandly, "But we can all do our best, Mr. Wayne."

And that makes Wayne's mouth tighten—the barest shift in his jaw, in the muscles around his eyes, but his gaze is suddenly fierce, black as the belly of a stormcloud. "Yes," he murmurs, "I suppose we can. And this is your best, huh, Superman? Flying around dressed like half a box of crayons, coming down to earth long enough to accept the worship of the adoring masses before fucking right back off to wherever the hell it is you came from—"

Clark stares at him. Anger is igniting in his gut like a fuse burning down—except he can't lose his temper at Wayne right now, no matter how much Wayne's provoking it. He can't. He was invited here as a guest, and he's Superman; he meant what he said, even if Wayne doesn't believe it. He _is_ doing his best. He has to.

And Superman's best involves a lot of things, but one of the most important ones is—he's careful with people. That was one of the first things Mom and Dad taught him, when he was a kid, and he's never let himself forget it. Clark could hurt someone so easily, and Dad had always made sure he understood what that meant, the responsibility it entailed; that if people were frightened of him it wouldn't be because they were stupid or cruel, but because they had good reason to be—because all it would take would be one outburst on his part, one moment of inattention, to justify that fear.

Black Zero hadn't done it. Not quite. But it had come so close. Clark hadn't known what he was doing, had had so many decisions to make so quickly; he'd done what he could to keep people safe, but he'd never fought anyone like Zod before. He'd never fought anyone at _all_ before, he'd never thrown a punch in his life, but suddenly he'd had to—suddenly everybody had been expecting him to, needing him to, because it had been the only way to save the world. There had been so much damage, and he hadn't quite been responsible for it but he hadn't prevented it either, and—

And that was what Superman was supposed to be for. He's done better since, he's—he's tried to do better, and this is part of it. When people like Bruce Wayne come up to him spilling venom, that's okay. He can take that, and he doesn't have to hurt anyone over it.

Though if Wayne had a truck outside, Clark thinks, he wouldn't say no to wrapping it around a telephone pole, just for old times' sake.

He swallows and looks away, and hopes none of that showed on his face. "Think whatever you like, Mr. Wayne," he says aloud. "I hope you enjoy the rest of your evening."

And he should keep standing here, there'll be more people who want to talk to him once Wayne's done, but he—it's all right if he takes a break, probably. Just for a minute.

He forces himself to meet Wayne's eyes long enough to nod to him before stepping away, and if it's a little stiff, a little chilly, Wayne can hardly blame him.

Except before he can get more than half a stride, Wayne's caught his arm.

Clark could pull away from it. He wouldn't even have to exert any effort. He could just keep walking as though he hadn't even felt it, except that wouldn't be right, either. Superman isn't passive-aggressive, and he definitely isn't petty; as if he needs to make any kind of show of strength, anyway, when everyone in this room knows he could pick this building up and throw it into the bay if he wanted to.

He stops and turns his head, looks over his shoulder at Wayne, and he makes sure his expression is nothing but cordial, one politely-inquiring eyebrow raised.

(Okay, maybe Superman is a little bit passive-aggressive, once in a while.)

"The thing is, it doesn't matter," Wayne says, and his voice is conversational but his grip on Clark's arm is—if Clark bruised, it would leave bruises. "You aren't stupid. You have to know it doesn't matter. No matter how many dangers you save this city from, or even this whole planet—the worst one will always be you."

And that's—

"I know," Clark hears himself say.

What other reply is there? It's true enough. Zod would never have come to Earth if it hadn't been for Clark's presence, and there are probably a dozen other ways Clark could have dealt with him—if he'd only thought of them, if he'd only acted more quickly, if he'd only been faster or stronger or smarter—

—if his best had only been _better_ —

He squeezes his eyes shut, and—gently, gently, he always has to be gentle—shakes Wayne's hand loose, and before anyone else can stop him, he's gone.

 

 

 

It only takes a couple seconds to get to an empty hallway. And it's tempting to keep going; but Superman's a guest of honor, and this might be a party but it's also a memorial.

So he just stands out there by himself for a minute, back pressed to the cool marble, until he's got his head on straight. He ends up running a hand over the chestplate, following the curves of the sigil of the House of El with his fingertips. Hope—and what is that except the belief that anything can get better? He just has to try harder, that's all. He's Superman: he can hardly claim that it's too much to expect, that he can't handle it. Ordinary people manage to make themselves better every day, and he's got every advantage he could ask for.

He takes a deep breath and goes back in, and makes sure he's smiling when he does.

The rest of the night is fine. Wayne doesn't come up to Clark again; Clark can't help keeping an eye out for him, listening for the hushed creak of Italian leather, Wayne's bland conversational tone of voice, but as meandering as Wayne's path through the gala is, it doesn't happen to cross Clark's at any point.

And everything else goes—fine. Clark's fine. Lois had told him she'd get there a couple hours late, and she does. And it's good to see her, even though Superman obviously can't greet her the way Clark would if he could, can't hug her and take her aside and talk to her all night. That's not what Superman is here to do.

Clark hates to admit it, but by the time the evening's almost over, everybody else has started to blur together a little. The mayor's staff has done a great job making sure that people keep moving, that nobody's ignoring the other guests of honor just to fawn over Superman—but he still feels like he's exchanged bland pleasantries with just about every single person in the whole building. He keeps smiling, makes sure his tone stays warm and pleasant, delivers every word he says as sincerely as he can. But it's so hard to really be _there_ for it; it's like he's watching himself do it instead, from just a little way away.

But at last people start to trickle out, a few at a time. After the crowd has really started to thin, the mayor's aide rescues him, shaking his hand and thanking him again for his attendance, and then leaning in to tell him wryly that he really doesn't have to stick around for the cleanup.

"Are you sure?" Clark says automatically, and then offers her a smile. "I do have superspeed, you know."

She laughs. "Tempting," she says, "very tempting, but don't worry. We're going to have plenty of help, and you've done more than enough for us tonight."

"I—standing here?" Clark asks, startled.

She laughs again and then pats the back of his hand. "You really think attendance would have been this high without you? The mayor's been trying to get into the same room with some of these people for weeks. Believe me, you've been invaluable."

Which doesn't seem quite right; it was a commemorative event. Surely there would have been plenty of people whether he'd shown up or not? But if she thinks he helped, he's not going to argue with her.

He doesn't get out the door without another run of handshakes, smiles, polite well-wishes. He could have just sped past, of course, but that seems ungenerous. A woman in green and gold is the last person to stop him, just before the entryway, but she's blissfully straightforward; she just touches his elbow briefly, tells him she's pleased to meet him and admires the work he's been doing, and then lets him go with a small sweet smile.

And then, at last, he's out—the night air is wonderfully cool against his face, which is what makes him belatedly realize just how stuffy it had gotten inside. He pauses on the last of the big broad marble steps, just to breathe it in and look up at the stars.

And when somebody pauses next to him and he glances over, about the last person he's expecting to see is Bruce Wayne.

Clark can't help but go still. He'd almost managed to settle back into himself; he'd been a minute away from taking off, and once he was up in the sky where no one could see him, he could've been Clark again, could've relaxed—his guard had already been three-quarters dropped.

But he looks at Bruce Wayne's face, that taut jaw and flat glare, the barest suggestion of a sneer shadowing the mouth, and he can feel his own face taking on Superman's stern uncompromising lines.

"Mr. Wayne. I must admit I wasn't expecting to speak to you again tonight."

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Bruce barely manages not to scoff. The alien's tone is measured, neutral, as if they aren't both perfectly well aware that he'd prefer never to speak to Bruce again at all if he could help it.

"Yes, I imagine that's true," he says aloud, in Bruce Wayne's most obnoxious drawl. "Why, it must be your lucky day."

That earns him a brief sharp glance, before Superman pointedly redirects his attention to the starry sky over them. And some part of Bruce can't help trying to pick it apart: a threat, followed by a not-so-subtle reminder that it's Superman he's talking to—his offworld origins, or that he could carry Bruce up there and drop him? Or both.

It's so hard to tell, looking at that exquisitely graven face. Superman's expressions are relatively well-controlled, and out here the stark cold white of streetlights, stars, only enhances the effect: he looks like sculpture, like stone, like ice.

Earlier—Bruce thought he'd almost managed to provoke a moment of uncertainty, even dismay. But had it been real, or had the alien only shown him what he'd wanted to see? If Superman _did_ have some sort of long-term plan in mind to—to win people over, to encourage positive public opinion of him to reach new heights, then a calculated display of emotion intended to disarm anyone who approached him with hostility might very well be one more step along the way, one more strategic contingency.

And Bruce has to keep that in mind. It's possible that the alien isn't trying to manipulate him at all, of course; but to treat that as true and then discover it had been a ploy all along would put Bruce at a far greater disadvantage than the reverse. Assuming the worst and duly preparing for it is the only objectively logical way to proceed. That's all there is to it.

But it might not just be objective logic that makes Bruce Wayne stuff his hands in his pockets and rock back on his heels, with a casual little hum. "You don't like me very much, huh?"

"Should I?" Superman murmurs, more chilly than curious.

"No, no, I can't say I'd expect you to," Bruce agrees. "Should I be expecting to suffer any imminent property damage? A long drop and a sudden stop?"

And that gets the alien to look at him again, that flawless brow furrowing in—what, disbelief?

"Excuse me?"

Bruce waves a hand idly at the Metropolis skyline, alive with lights in front of them despite the hour. "You only took out one Wayne Enterprises tower in Metropolis during Black Zero. There's still a good half-dozen left to go, if you're hoping to bat a thousand."

Superman's face changes again, quick—a shadow passing over that Bruce can't quite parse before it's gone, and then wiped clean, that flat neutral perfection that never quite looks real. "You don't know anything about me, Mr. Wayne," he says quietly, "or you'd know that's the last thing I want."

"Oh? Is that so," Bruce says, as if it's the most interesting thing he's heard all day. "And tell me, if you would: why the hell should I believe that?"

The alien looks away. "Mr. Wayne—"

"Everybody in there is willing to let you pretend," Bruce murmurs, leaning in just a little, just enough to violate the standard boundaries of personal space. Just to test, he tells himself, just to see what the alien might do; and it doesn't matter that he almost wants it, is as eager for a shove or a blow as he is braced for it, helpless thrumming intensity crackling through him. The danger, he decides. This is the principle upon which he's built his life, after all: fear isn't allowed to hinder him. It only makes him more effective. "As long as you stand there smiling, shaking hands and kissing babies, they don't mind going along with the fiction. They don't mind treating you like something safe. Hell, they like it; makes them sleep better at night, thinking their friendly neighborhood Superman is looking out for them.

"But they're kidding themselves, and you know it. They're kidding themselves because the other option is to be terrified out of their goddamn minds, knowing you're out there, knowing you could burn the whole world down and there's no power on this earth that could stop you."

And that, at last, is a spark of frustration, somewhere behind those cool eyes; a shift of the alien's weight, and Bruce tenses, readying himself, because surely now it will happen—surely Superman will push him, shoulder him aside, strike him—

(— _touch_ him—)

" _You_."

Bruce turns at the voice—almost a shout, and he's distantly frustrated with himself for having been startled by it.

(Not that it matters, if people catch Bruce Wayne by surprise; but it should be intentional, Bruce should have to choose to allow it—

Then again, in this particular instance it's a matter of having trained every scrap of attention on the alien, who outstrips every other threat in Metropolis by an unthinkably vast margin. So perhaps in that context his failure is excusable.)

A man in a wheelchair, and for a moment looking at him is like walking off the edge of a cliff; Bruce has seen that face a hundred times, a thousand, but only ever in the context of one instant, replaying relentlessly on the backs of his eyelids for a year now. It's disorienting, bewildering, to see it here.

But for a second, Bruce almost feels—glad. To think that Wally Keefe was taken care of, that the amputations were successful, that he hadn't lost too much blood or gone into shock or any of the five dozen other things that could have killed him. That he had the resources to heal, that he's gotten what he needs to handle all the ways in which his life has changed; and it's selfish, of course, but that he had those resources in part because of Bruce—

And then Bruce meets Wally Keefe's eyes, and is suddenly sure he's wrong. Because he knows exactly where Wally's been for the past twelve months

(—the exact same place as Bruce: tickle of dust, ash, smoke; choking on it, nose and mouth and throat, tongue, the taste of it—the air, the artificial heat of it, weird and smothering. Everything strange, muffled, the sounds and the sun and the sky, except the most useless little details: the scrape of concrete against his hands, his arms, every tiny imperfection against the tips of his fingers as he dug them into the sidewalk and tried not to scream—)

and "healing" isn't the word for it.

Wayne Enterprises has been mailing out a whole lot of checks lately, and Bruce has spent a lot of time telling himself it matters. Because it does. It isn't everything; it isn't nearly enough, in fact. But there are so many other things he can't fix, and medical bills add up. What might for someone else be an impossible burden can be solved with one click by Bruce Wayne. It's worth it.

But there are a whole bunch of other ways he failed Wallace Keefe in particular on Black Zero. It's all too easy to imagine that those impersonal envelopes with Bruce's name in the corner, arriving steadily month after month, felt like individual precisely-spaced slaps in the face.

Wally's face twists as he wheels furiously closer, and Bruce wishes distantly that Wally had shown up at the office instead. Then at least Bruce could have ushered him behind a closed door somewhere. There's only two or three other people out on the steps right now besides Bruce and the alien, or Bruce would never have pushed for a confrontation—but Wally doesn't look like he's going to be trying not to draw attention. If Bruce Wayne were drunk enough, he could probably manage a certain overwrought sort of sympathy without venturing too far out of character.

Bruce steels himself for it, settles a vague look of inquiry on his face, and only then realizes that Wally's gaze has skipped right past him.

"You," Wally says again, low and sharp, and yanks hard on both wheels at once so that his chair bumps with a punctuational thump against the side of the lowest stair. "You—how _dare_ you, you fucking—" and he's not saying it to Bruce.

He's saying it to Superman.

Bruce flicks a glance over, can't stop himself; and it must be deliberate, a show put on, feigned, but the alien looks exactly the way Bruce Wayne can't. No ice now, no marble. Superman's weight has faltered back into his heels, shoulders dropping almost defensively, brows drawing together in pained uncertainty. "Sir," he says quietly, but he doesn't get any further before Wally barks out a bitter laugh.

"How dare you," Wally says again, louder. "After what you've done—how can you even be here? Where do you get the nerve? Look at what you did to me—"

"Sir—"

" _Look_. Look at what you did. And they're throwing you a goddamn party." Wally shakes his head once, a disbelieving jerk, and laughs again—but there's a funny edge in it, and even in the dimness out here Bruce can see his eyes are wet.

He can't say what Bruce Wayne would say to that face. The closest he can make himself get is, "Wally, right? Wally Keefe," and even that comes out much too careful.

"Oh, hey, Mr. Wayne," Wally says, expression giving the lie to the sudden false cheer in his tone. "Wow, yeah, great to see you again. It's been a while, right? Just about a year now, if I'm not mistaken."

Bruce bites the inside of his cheek, and doesn't let the bland look on his own face change. "I remember."

"Sure," Wally says, ragged and much too bright. "Sure, I bet you do. I bet you do. Everybody remembers that day, right? And you—you've been getting my notes, I hope. A friend helped me write them."

"Your notes," Bruce repeats, though he can't imagine what Wally means by that; if he can just get Wally to elaborate, maybe he can figure it out, get a handle on this—

But Wally's already moving on. "Not the kind of thing a person can forget. Not the kind of thing anybody should forget—"

"No," Superman agrees, soft.

"—but people do, you know? Just paper right over it, pretend it never happened. But I remember. Do you understand? It was you. You brought your war here, and we paid for it. _I_ paid for it, and now I have nothing."

"Wally—"

"And _you_ ," Wally spits, "you—coming here tonight, standing right here next to him, clinking your fucking champagne glass and smiling at him. You _are_ blind. He's the _enemy_ , don't you understand that? Somebody has to do something—"

Bruce could laugh—almost does, except it would be the wrong move in every possible sense and he's choking on a little too much irony to get it out anyway. _I do understand_ , he can't say. _I know what he is, I know what needs to be done—I'm trying, I'm trying, you have to believe me—_

Except Wally's half right, or at least a quarter. In this one way, Bruce and the alien _are_ the same: they both bear responsibility for what happened to Wally. To wildly differing degrees, admittedly; Bruce wouldn't have been put in a position to fail to save Wally if Superman hadn't been there.

But he was, and Bruce was, and Wally's life will never be the same because of it.

"Somebody has to do something about you," Wally is repeating, jabbing an unsteady hand up at the alien. "You can't just _be_ here, you can't just pretend it's over and it doesn't matter and everything's okay."

"I know," Superman says.

And agreement is apparently just enough of a surprise to Wally to bring him jerking to a halt.

"I know it's not okay. What happened to you was terrible, and it shouldn't have happened. I could have prevented it, but I didn't. I didn't, and I'm sorry."

Wally shudders in his chair, jaw working, mouth twisting, like he can't stand to hear it. "Shut up," he says, uneven, hoarse. "Shut up, shut up—"

"I'm sorry," Superman says again—as if he's caught in the same loop as Wally, as if he can't help it. (Illusion; it must be. Superman can do as he pleases.) "Mr. Keefe—"

It happens so fast Bruce is caught flat-footed. Superman steps down onto the pavement, as if to put himself on a level with Wally—and Bruce thinks that's going to be all, except he leans in, too, reaching out carefully for Wally's shoulder.

But Wally's shoulder isn't there anymore. Wally's heaved himself up against one arm of the wheelchair, swinging out wildly with his free hand—his free _fist_ —

Bruce hears the blow land and is already grimacing, throwing a hand forward belatedly; as if catching Wally's elbow now will do any good. Striking out like that at Superman with his bare knuckles—Wally will be lucky if he hasn't broken his arm, never mind his wrist and half the bones in his hand.

Except even as Bruce's fingers finally catch on Wally's shirtsleeve, Bruce realizes the motion in the corner of his eye is Superman. Superman's head, turning.

And Wally doesn't scream. There's no crack, no snap. "—get _away_ from me, shut _up_ ," he shouts, and the second Bruce's grip settles onto his arm he jerks it away, lurching so far to the other side that the wheelchair almost tips.

The alien catches it: a fingertip against the far arm, just for an instant. But of course he can exert more than enough pressure that way to counteract all of Wally's weight.

There are half a dozen people on the steps now, staring, eyes drawn by the noise—and another ten or twelve on the sidewalk, on the other side of the street, pausing in passing to see what the trouble is. Superman must know they're there; but he isn't looking at them. He doesn't look up at all, doesn't speed off in a blur, doesn't fly away and leave this whole messy scene behind. He's just watching Wally, gaze steady and sober and impossibly blue. On purpose—it must be on purpose, but—

But, if anything, Bruce had expected the same sort of distant, patronizing patience Superman had shown Bruce himself. It's only reasonable that Superman should be conscious of optics, public perception; he hadn't killed Bruce five minutes ago, not with people around, and there's no reason to think he'd kill Wally. But he still could have caught Wally's arm before it ever touched him. He'd let Wally hit him, he must have—and he'd turned with the blow to keep Wally from hurting himself by it. It couldn't have been anything but deliberate.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Keefe," Superman says again, very low. "I know you have no reason to believe me, and less than no reason to forgive me. But if there's a chance it could ever be a comfort to you to know it—I'm sorry."

Wally's face crumples; he squeezes his eyes shut and presses the back of one hand against his mouth, and shakes his head sharply once, and then again. "I don't care," he says at last, unsteadily, and it would be so much more convincing if there weren't something pleading lurking in his tone. "I don't care. _Don't_ touch me," and that's snapped out suddenly, in the direction of the hand Superman still has outstretched toward him. "Just don't—" and with a twist of his wrist he's turned the chair sharply away from the steps, and is wheeling off along the sidewalk.

The alien is just standing there, reaching out toward the space where Wally was. Bruce refuses to name the look on his face, refuses to be so recklessly generous as to attribute sincere emotion where none may exist; but it isn't threatening, doesn't presage imminent danger, so it's safe for Bruce to direct his attention temporarily after Wally. If anything happens to him now, within half a block of both of them, after that—

A car is pulling up. Gleaming, black: picking someone up from the gala, Bruce would assume, except it slows much too early. Early enough to come to a stop just a few strides ahead of Wally.

For a moment, Bruce's head is filling with all the worst things. A driveby, an assassination, hostage-taking. But when one of those mirror-polished doors opens, a slim woman steps out alone. And if she's concealing a weapon, she's doing it very, very well, in a dress that closely-tailored.

Bruce narrows his eyes. She looks almost familiar, though he can't decide why.

But she's clearly familiar to Wally. Bruce doesn't have to be any closer to them to pick out the sequence of it: Wally's head lifting, an arm moving, as he scrubs furiously at his wet face; the moment when he sees her, the hand he drops in reaction, the jerk of wheels as he steers around her.

The woman doesn't give up right away. She steps out in front of Wally, not confrontational so much as firmly suggesting, and the door of the car is still open behind her. An invitation, maybe—and if it is, then that decided shake of the head is Wally very much refusing it, before he dodges around her a second time and keeps going.

Bruce spares a moment to assess the car's make, to memorize the plate information; even if it's a rental, he'll have somewhere to start. But he can't help returning to the woman's face, to that nagging feeling that he ought to be able to name her.

And he's never liked to let an opportunity pass him by. She's turned away for a moment, watching Wally leave, but she'll have to turn back toward Bruce to get back into the car—and she does. He lifts a hand to his collar pin, and nudges it once, again, with a fingertip to prompt a high-intensity scan. It was designed for short-range, not distance, but even a blurred image of her face will give him a baseline to match against.

The car pulls away; and Bruce turns from the place where it was to reassess. The small crowd across the street has mostly dispersed; the crowd on the near side has been a little slower to break up, but now that the show is evidently over, even the stragglers have begun to scatter.

Amongst the flow of them, Bruce catches for a moment on an unexpected stillness, the rock around which the river has split: a tall woman in green and gold, unmoving. She's familiar, too, but she's standing on the uppermost step, she can't have been out here long—he must have seen her inside, then. And she's looking quietly back at him. Still watching, though what for, now that Wally's gone, Bruce can't imagine. Touching his collar pin could hardly have done it; and she wasn't out here earlier, she couldn't possibly have heard his argument with Superman.

Who's—still here. Bruce had half-expected him to take the opening Bruce had given in looking away, but he hasn't moved at all, except to belatedly lower that hand he'd been holding out.

"Well," Bruce drawls, with a little punctuational bounce on the balls of his feet. "That was exciting."

The alien doesn't spare him a glance. "With all due respect, Mr. Wayne," he says quietly, "go to hell."

And there are a whole lot of ways Bruce is tempted to respond to that—but Bruce Wayne's choice of reply, as always, takes precedence in public. "You know, you aren't the first person to issue that particular invitation to yours truly," Bruce observes, conversational. "And you also aren't the first person to whom I've had the honor of replying: sure thing, peaches. See you there."

Still, still, Superman doesn't look at him; the alien's eyes fall shut instead, and if it's a blow, he's allowing it to land, just like he did for Wally.

How generous of him, Bruce thinks bitterly.

And then—he doesn't even have to move, doesn't tense or raise an arm. He just comes up off the ground like gravity's let go of him, and in a moment he's a streak of blue, and then he's gone.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Clark doesn't slow down until he's back inside the ship. Coming to a stop so fast is—there's a long stretched moment where the rush of air is still screaming in his ears, his outstretched hands looking almost frozen in front of him; and then his palms touch the wall of the ship, cool smooth metal under his hands, and it's just him, the sound of his own breath coming fast, in the dim quiet.

He doesn't know exactly how long he stands there. After a while, it occurs to him distantly that he's done, there's no one around—he doesn't have to wear all this anymore. The metal parts all just sort of joined themselves, when he positioned them in the right places; he tugs on the chestpiece, absent, once and then again, and the second time it disengages with a faint clinking susurration and comes away in his hands.

One pauldron, the other, and then he slides his fingertips along the front of the jacket-robe, in a swooping line along each of the sleeve-cuffs, and feels the material part. He'd thought there might be fastenings, when he first put it on. But it turns out this style of formalwear works the same way as the suit, the same way all Kryptonian technology seems to: able to part and reform, split and remake itself, repair itself, never anything less than whole—

—and is that what people see when they look at Superman? Something untouched, unmarked, pristine, when they were all left scarred?

He lets it all slide off him until he's left in just the uniform, and steps carefully out of the puddle of it on the deck. And then he walks away from it, crosses the chamber with slow deliberate steps, and slams his fist into the wall.

The ship isn't quite as unbreakable as Clark is; metal gives way under his knuckles with a groan, a shudder. And then he draws his hand back, absently flexing his fingers, and watches the wall shift—flow—resettle. Pristine. Unmarked.

Kryptonian. Kryptonian ship, Kryptonian clothes, Kryptonian _body_ , and Clark's never hated that fact so much. When he was a kid, he'd been afraid of it. He'd even resented it. Except that hadn't been about Clark himself as much as it had been about _why_ , about whatever it was that had made him like this—and back then, he hadn't known. The closest things to answers that he'd ever gotten, that it was a gift or that it was God, that he was special, that he was meant for something, had all come with a shrug on the side: nobody could possibly know for sure. At the end of the day, it was ineffable.

And then he'd found this ship in the ice, and—and _that_ had been a gift. That had felt like everything he could possibly have wanted, every answer and then some. He'd learned where he came from, why he was the way he was, and he'd been so glad.

(The screen, the flickering letters before Zod's message had played: YOU ARE NOT ALONE. The one thing Clark had always wanted most to hear—)

Clark digs his fingers into the wall and squeezes his eyes shut. If only he'd known better, then. God, he wishes he'd never found this damn ship, never met another Kryptonian—if he'd only destroyed the pod, the beacon, and never tried to find out anything else; if he'd only figured out how to settle for ineffable.

But it's too late now.

And this is just how Wally Keefe must have felt on Black Zero: exactly the same way Clark did. Everything overturned in an instant, knowing it even as it happens without being able to _stop_ it; no going back and no do-overs, and it hadn't even been his decision—but everyone who's to blame for it is out of his reach. Except, in both their cases, for Clark. Not that he can punch himself much more effectively than Wally could. And Wally hit him hard, but of course even that isn't going to leave a mark. Not on Clark.

Nothing can.

 

 

 

He doesn't bother changing out of the suit, though he doesn't ask it to regrow the cape right away. He heads back to the secondary data drive instead, because he needs something to do and because—

And because the ship's one thing he might actually be able to fix.

He gets interrupted a few times, once by a fire, and then twice in quick succession by a twelve-car pileup just outside the city and a mudslide in New Zealand. But he still manages to get one more line of drifting data-motes to light up, and then a second.

"Ship?"

"Secondary data drive inoperable," the ship reports, its standard baseline; but then it pauses and adds, "Data cache specifications found; cache structure analysis complete."

"Cache structure—so you can tell what's in there?"

"Limited data regarding cache organization and contents is available," the ship hedges, and then offers, as if to make up for the bad news, "Chance of projection data inclusion approaching seventy-two percent."

And that's by far the best set of odds it's given him. Clark stares at the curve of the wall over him and almost can't get his head around it. It took him months to even learn that there _was_ a secondary data drive—or at least something the ship described that way when it had to talk to him, since the Kryptonian terms and concepts probably didn't translate all that well. And now—

Now he's almost got it. When Zod's ship had been destroyed, the projection of Jor-El had still been running somewhere on it; Clark hadn't thought there'd be any way to get it back. It had felt like kind of a cruel irony, at the time: taking out the World Engine, the Black Zero, and defeating Zod had meant losing any chance to really understand any of it. Jor-El, or at least the shadow of him, had known so much more about Krypton in its last days than the ship alone—and Clark still hasn't figured out how to settle for ineffable. If there's even a fraction of a possibility that Jor-El can tell him something, _anything_ , about General Zod, about who he was and how he'd lived, why he'd done all the things he'd done, then Clark has to keep trying.

It won't fix Black Zero. But it might make it more—more endurable. More bearable.

( _Something_ will.

Surely something will.)

"Run data restoration and verification analysis?"

"Yes—please," Clark says to the ceiling absently, and somewhere in the corner of his mind's eye, he thinks he can see another distant light-stream flickering to life.

 

 

 

He doesn't sleep. It's not like he needs to, anyway. He's sort of aware of time passing, somewhere out there around him; and then suddenly there's light. Not data-light, not in Clark's head. Actual light, glinting off the wall.

Clark blinks and tilts his head to watch it for a second, the warm clean glow of it across the graceful curves and ripples of the ship's interior. And then it occurs to him to wonder exactly how it got in here.

He eases away from the gap in the wall to look at the ceiling—and at the artfully curved set of translucent panes, neatly spaced between the arched struts along the walls, that definitely were not there earlier.

"Is that even real sunlight?"

"It matches the luminance, intensity, and electromagnetic profile of Earth-normal solar radiation with ninety-eight percent accuracy," the ship hedges, after a moment. "And is currently being projected at an angle corresponding to the position of Sol relative to this planet."

"Yeah, I didn't think that was an exterior wall," Clark murmurs, but he can't help laughing a little. "Ninety-eight percent?"

"The interior illumination system is functioning within acceptable limits," the ship says, "but subroutines intended to enhance the precision of its output are low-priority and have been temporarily deactivated."

Clark settles a hand gently against the wall. "Still got some work to do, huh?"

The ship looks so much better now than it did a year ago. Clark coaxed it through the process of restoring its outer hull integrity—which mostly meant using his laser vision on the weird flickering sphere where it apparently stored power, because Kryptonian things could only put themselves back together when they had the juice for it. And it had woken up enough to give him a damage report—half in Kryptonian, the first time through, because the translation matrix hadn't been a particularly high priority—and they'd muddled through together from there, every piece and part and system.

And it's so much better now that sometimes it's hard to remember it's still a little bit broken.

Clark hesitates. He'd been unfair to it before: it wasn't unmarked after all, hadn't gone undamaged. It just looked like it; but being able to take a punch wasn't the same as—as being all right.

"Hey," he says aloud. "I'm—I'm sorry about before."

"Clarify."

"When I—damaged the wall. You had to fix it. I'm sorry; I shouldn't have done that."

The ship is silent for a moment. "Interior structural integrity is currently over eighty-six percent," it says at last. "Without your assistance, this could not have been achieved. If your emotional and psychological wellbeing requires that you damage a wall—"

"No, no," Clark says quickly, "it's not going to happen again. I won't do that again."

"If your emotional and psychological wellbeing were, hypothetically, to require that you damage a wall," the ship amends, "it would not decrease interior structural integrity by an unacceptable margin. Standard ship's protocols would permit it."

Clark bites his lip, trying not to laugh again. The ship clearly can't figure out why he's apologizing to it, but it's trying to reassure him anyway. That's kind of sweet. "Thanks," he says carefully. "But I won't do that again. Maybe you can fabricate me a punching bag sometime instead. Okay?"

"Standard ship's protocols would permit that as well," the ship agrees.

"Great. And—thanks for the light, too." Because today of all days, after that extended a public appearance by Superman, Clark Kent probably shouldn't be conspicuously late for work.

 

 

 

He uses the speed a little, on his way to the Planet office—just to make absolutely sure he's at his desk before Lois and Cat can arrive. They were the other two Planet staff at the gala; coming in with or after them is the kind of coincidence he needs to avoid.

And everybody's asking them how it was, who they saw, whether the booze was any good. Clark thinks for a second that Lois is just planning to give Clark Kent, Small-Town Boy, a chance to do the same thing, when he sees her coming toward his desk; except her mouth is just a little too flat for that, her eyes just a little too wide.

She papers over it with a smile, says, "And you, Smallville, you curious about our big-city parties?"—for Ron's sake, probably, because he's passing close enough to hear. And then she leans in and catches Clark's arm and asks him the last question he was expecting from her: "God, Clark—are you okay?"

Clark blinks. "What? I'm fine. What do you mean, am I okay?"

Lois's mouth tightens. "Keefe," she says quietly.

Oh. "You were still inside," Clark hears himself say. "You didn't see that."

"No, I didn't," Lois agrees. "But Cat was on her way out just as the three of you were wrapping up."

"The three of—"

"You, Keefe, and Bruce _Wayne_ ," and Lois counts the first two off on her fingers and then throws both hands up on the third. "Of all people—what were you even talking to him about?"

And there's a question Clark knows better than to answer. He looks away and says, "Nothing much."

"Sure," Lois says, bone-dry. "Look, I know he donated the GDP of a small country to the city fund back when it happened, but that doesn't mean you have to stand there and let him drunkenly schmooze at you. And it _definitely_ doesn't mean you have to let him orchestrate some kind of PR trap—"

"What?"

"Keefe," Lois says. "He's a Wayne Enterprises employee. Or he was, at least."

"No, I—I know that," Clark says. "Wayne knew him. Wayne knew his name. But he didn't know Keefe would be there. They hadn't seen each other for months, before last night."

Lois's expression turns dubious. "And you're sure about that."

" _Yes_. Keefe said it, not Wayne, and he was—there was something else, too," Clark says, trying to drag the memory back. "Something about notes he'd been writing to Wayne, or to the company. Wayne didn't know what he was talking about. He didn't set that up, Lois."

"Oh, of course not. He just happened to be standing next to you when Wallace Keefe punched you in the face," Lois says—reflexive, Clark thinks, an automatic riposte, because even as the last word leaves her mouth, her face is softening. "Are you _sure_ you're all right?"

Clark looks away again. "Sure I'm sure. Why are you asking me? Keefe's the one who could have broken his hand."

"Right," Lois says, crossing her arms. "Sticks and stones? Really? That's the tack you're taking here?"

Clark feels his jaw clench, and tells himself to take it easy. It's Lois, it's fine; nobody's attacking him right now. She's just asking, because she cares about him and she was worried, and she wants to know.

And when he thinks about it like that, it's not hard to look her in the eye again. He touches one of her elbows lightly, and says, "I'm fine, Lo. Really. That part wasn't fun, you're right. But it was important for Superman to be there, and I'm still glad I went. Okay?"

Her mouth tightens, and for a long moment she doesn't say anything, gaze flicking back and forth across his face, searching. But whatever she needs to see, she must find it, because at last she blows out a breath and says, "Okay. All right. As long as you're sure."

"Yeah," Clark says, and squeezes her arm. "But thanks for checking," and in the end it's the easiest thing in the world, to smile up at her until she smiles back.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

The scanner data, naturally, yields next to no insight on Superman. It's both fascinating and irritating: all the readings Bruce was able to collect suggest that the alien's skeletal structure and musculature, and quite possibly the majority of his internal organs, are human-normal, at least in superficial respects. Bruce had never thought it particularly likely that Superman was a tentacle-beast carefully zipped into a humanoid suit, however fond the internet was of claiming otherwise; but he'd been hoping for some sort of incongruity. A flag, however small, that could be scanned for again in future—that would allow him to immediately identify an alien if one passed him on the street.

(One. That's what General Zod had said. _For some time, your world has sheltered one of my species._ He'd had no reason to lie: if he'd wanted Superman to continue to go unnoticed, all he'd had to do was _not_ tell the entire planet about him. No reason to suggest the possibility but lie about the number—

—but how can Bruce _know_? How can he be sure? How can he presume that he correctly understands the aims and strategies of an alien mind? The fate of the world depends on it; this is no time to place unearned trust in the word choice of someone who'd wanted to watch Earth die.)

But the vast gulf between Superman's abilities and standard human attributes appears to be more a matter of chemistry, the processing and generation of energy and the reactions of structures under stresses, than of any specific additional organs.

Perhaps half of it is just vestigial. As essential as a gallbladder or an appendix, with the convenient side effect of rendering Superman a perfect cuckoo's child. As if Bruce's job weren't hard enough already.

Bruce sighs and scrubs a hand through his hair.

He should be pleased. It had been precisely the sort of opportunity he'd hoped for when he'd first learned about the gala—he could hardly have gotten any closer to Superman, shaking his hand or standing beside him on the steps of the Padovano Building in starlight. And he has reached a new understanding of the general principles potentially underlying Superman's biology, even if the most he can do with that right now is tailor the alien a suit.

(Not that Superman needs the help. Wherever he'd gotten that thing, it had fit him perfectly: the metallic curves crossing the chest and shoulders subtly suggestive of the muscle beneath; the seams drawing the eye helplessly down the line of the torso, the hips—

Deliberate. It must have been. He'd intended to make a good impression, and no doubt plenty of the guests had caught themselves admiring him in ways they might not have if he'd worn his usual uniform. That's all there is to it.)

But Bruce finds himself thinking that perhaps the most important thing that happened tonight had had somewhat less to do with the alien and somewhat more to do with Wally Keefe.

Not that there isn't plenty to analyze in Superman's reaction. In Superman's reaction, and in Bruce's own reaction to it—because he had been surprised, he couldn't pretend otherwise, and that can only mean that he missed something. There's some factor involved in the alien's decision-making process that Bruce has failed to perceive, some value or variable being attributed a weight Bruce hasn't been able to measure. And perhaps it is as simple as some subtler power he's missed; perhaps the alien had looked right inside his head, had chosen the course likeliest to give him pause. It can hardly be ruled out, at this point.

(And surely telepathy, deliberate manipulation, intentional lies, are more likely than—than spontaneous and uncoerced gentleness. Of all the ludicrous explanations, that, Bruce can't help thinking, is by far the most extreme.)

But Wally—Wally's arrival, Wally's words, Wally and the woman and the car—all those things had surprised Bruce, too. And while Bruce loathes being surprised by Superman, he can accept that it's a natural consequence of the sheer number of unknowns, of Superman's senses and abilities, of the fact that Bruce has spent a year scrambling to catch up with an alien who can break the sound barrier. The same does not apply to whatever combination of circumstances brought Wally to the Padovano Building, to whoever he meant when he said _a friend of mine_ and to whoever had sent that car to fetch him.

That's something Bruce should have been more than able to see coming. 

He moves the scanner readouts on Superman sideways to another monitor, and pulls up the final set of data he'd captured on the one in front of him. The numbers are iffy, the scanner trying to turn sidewalk and car and even a nearby tree into a single object and failing—but the visual data is perfectly fine, the resolution even better than Bruce had expected. He shouldn't have any trouble running a comparison against the database and coming up with some facial matches.

And he's right to think so: the first match is made within minutes.

It takes a moment for him to pinpoint the reason for it, when he accesses the file in question; the most obvious feature of the photograph is none other than Lex Luthor, standing at a podium, which is nothing Bruce is particularly interested in seeing either live or digitally immortalized. But behind him and just to one side, hands clasped behind her back and gaze directed with polite attention toward Luthor, is the woman—the same woman who'd stepped out of that gleaming car and tried to usher Wally Keefe away.

And of course she's not named in the caption, but Bruce doesn't need her to be. The context is enough to ring a distant bell. Mercy Graves.

Luthor's corporate activities are mostly confined to Metropolis; Wayne Enterprises has tangled with him occasionally, competed with LuthorCorp or LexCorp or whatever the hell he's calling it now for deals or contracts. And Bruce does, somewhere, have a file with a list of Luthor's main associates that quietly updates itself on a bimonthly schedule—the same baseline level of attention Bruce pays to any public figure in the area near Gotham who crosses a particular threshold of significance. Bruce has probably seen Graves's name before.

But in the dark, at a distance, in a context that had nothing to do with Luthor and everything to do with Superman, he'd never have dredged it up.

He gazes at the photo a little longer, at Graves's face, at Luthor's, and then spares a glance for the article. It's a good photo—nothing spectacular about the subject matter, and yet this James Olsen managed to catch Luthor at an angle that allowed the camera to capture the weird intensity in Luthor's expression, a sense of grasping entitlement in Luthor's outstretched hand as he gestures.

And there's a certain sardonic edge to the Planet's portrayal of the event, and to the choice of quotation from Luthor's remarks. A groundbreaking, it seems; and there's no individual sentence in the coverage that can be singled out as insulting, but the overall tone of the piece is skeptical nonetheless, casting unspoken doubt on everything from Luthor's motives to the employment projections for the new building.

Bruce snorts at a particularly sharp juxtaposition—the paragraph discussing those projections was placed immediately before a summary, brightly innocent in tone, of the fate of the _last_ building Luthor constructed in Metropolis, which apparently suffered some kind of lab containment failure and is now a fenced-off and particularly hazardous brownfield of an empty lot. And then he casts an eye up to the byline and goes abruptly still in his chair.

Lois Lane.

Bruce has considered and rejected the idea of approaching Lane dozens of times, since Black Zero. All the evidence suggests that she has as much information as anyone else on the planet, and possibly more—that she'd known about Superman before anyone else, that she'd been involved one way or another in Black Zero. Bruce has pored over the events of that day repeatedly, has constructed timelines for every principal participant he can identify; and Lane had left the city on the invitation of the military and then reappeared in the middle of it in Superman's arms. The precise sequence of events in between is still unclear, of course—even if Bruce had had forewarning, had known where to look for her, he wouldn't necessarily have been inclined to draw attention to Batman by attempting to breach a military perimeter on short notice. But it's safe to conclude she had been party to most or all of Superman's interactions during Black Zero.

Unfortunately for Bruce, she also seems to have established some sort of rapport with the alien. And, of course, she's a reporter. Bruce Wayne could orchestrate a meeting with a reporter, but couldn't get away with asking the questions Bruce needs answered; and Batman could ask the questions, but these days Lane is the go-to authority on figures previously assumed to have been more fiction than fact. The last thing Bruce should be doing is walking up to chat with her as the Gotham Batman. Except—

Except, depending on how strong that rapport actually is, how often she's in contact with the alien, she may already know. Superman may already have mentioned their midnight standoff over the cameras. And if that breach has already occurred, then risk of exposure to Lane is no longer a factor Bruce should be including in his assessment.

Bruce leans back in his chair and closes his eyes. Think it through. Wally Keefe's appearance at the gala hadn't been set up by anyone, except maybe Wally himself. He hadn't arrived with Graves; she'd only shown up after he'd begun to draw attention. She worked for Luthor—so someone had seen Wally, notified Luthor, and he'd sent Graves? Or they'd known that Wally might be tempted to go

(—and who could blame him? Superman had been responsible for the worst day of his life, had changed everything for him in ways a year's time wasn't nearly enough to deal with, and then the city had thrown the alien a goddamn _party_ —)

and had been on the lookout for it. But either way—Graves had arrived, had stepped out of that car and talked to Wally. And he knew her, hadn't been surprised to see her; this wasn't the first time they'd interacted.

 _You've been getting my notes, I hope. A friend helped me write them_ —and Bruce still doesn't know what that means, he'll have to run a thorough check on correspondence to and from the office with Wally Keefe's name on it first thing in the morning. But it can't help but send a shiver of foreboding up his spine, to think Wally'd said _a friend_ and meant Alexander Luthor, Jr.

And Graves hadn't shown up to congratulate Wally. She'd come to hustle him away quietly. Which means something has been given away; this is Luthor's hand showing, if Bruce can only work out how. Luthor's not the kind of person who'd take an interest in Wally Keefe for Wally Keefe's sake—the only thing about Wally that seems at all likely to have caught Luthor's attention is the way he lost his legs during Black Zero, the way he's struggling to handle it.

How could they have known? Had Luthor just—dug through lists of Black Zero victims, looking for the worst trauma cases with the weakest support networks: people with no living family members nearby, with permanent or chronic injuries, with unfilled prescriptions or unused referrals to psychiatrists? Above and beyond all the ways in which that train of thought is a nauseating ride, it suggests a commitment of resources with genuine scope; a long-term plan.

Which means Luthor has something in mind he wants to use Wally for. And whatever that is—because the gala _wasn't_ it—it has something to do with Black Zero, with the response or the reaction or the event itself. It has something to do with Superman.

And if Superman knows what—he won't tell Batman, and he won't tell Bruce Wayne, either. Even if Bruce could track him down and ask. But Lane—

It's tempting to assume that any connection between Superman and Luthor is being heartily encouraged by both of them. It's all too easy to imagine the alien endeavoring to ingratiate himself to the rich and powerful; and maybe all Luthor's going to do with Wally Keefe is set him up for a fall, promise him the opportunity to denounce Superman in public and then undercut him at the last moment, one way or another.

But Wally's appearance, Superman's bewilderment—it doesn't quite fit that narrative. If Luthor and the alien are coordinating, they aren't doing it very well; and it's not really Luthor's style, Bruce thinks grimly, to lean on humility, self-abasement, as the foundation for a PR stunt. No plan that had been cooked up by Luthor would hinge on Superman apologizing too softly for the crowd to hear, or resignedly taking a punch.

And whatever else it is that's going on here—a grudge-match? A one-sided vendetta? Luthor able to put the pieces together just as well as Bruce, planning to wait until the alien showed his true colors and then set himself up somehow as Earth's savior—Lane might know about it. Judging by this article, she doesn't much care for Luthor; and the alien considers her an ally. If Bruce can only find the right way to present the possibility to her, she might be willing to talk to him.

Might. But a slim chance is better than none.

 

 


	3. Grasp your partner's hand firmly.

 

 

**Grasp your partner's hand firmly.**

_Make sure your hand is oriented correctly, with the palm facing neither up nor down but rather positioned so as to meet your partner's palm; wrap your hand around your partner's in a secure clasp. Don't grip too hard! The intensity of your grasp should be moderate, and if your partner appears uncomfortable, loosen up._

 

Bruce doesn't rush it. This is important, and he's only going to have one shot at it.

He familiarizes himself a bit at a time with the major fixtures of Lane's daily routine: when she leaves for work, when she comes home, anywhere she tends to end up in between. She isn't particularly predictable—she works long and often irregular hours, and of course Perry White gives her a relatively free rein to chase down stories that catch her eye; Bruce is familiar with the wide-ranging scope and unexpected detours an investigation can take on as it progresses, so it's not a surprise that Lane is rarely in the same place twice.

But he does begin to get a sense for the routes she prefers. Lane likes to walk, when she has the option, and she doesn't like heavy traffic—doesn't like being stuck for too long, if Bruce had to guess, without being able to get anywhere. And, luckily for Bruce, she doesn't seem to have any particular aversion to going out late at night.

At the moment, she's working on a story involving real estate development, which is even luckier; after the first property or two, it's easy to work out a pattern, draw up a list of her likeliest targets—and when she's not interested in being noticed, the amount of time she spends working after hours increases substantially. Makes it much more straightforward for Batman to keep an eye on her.

And then it turns out he's not the only one trying.

He notices Lane's tail a minute or two before she does—and to be fair to her, he has the advantage of a bat's-eye view. Her only immediate reaction is a slight increase in her pace, a little tension across the upper back; she doesn't panic, doesn't start looking over her shoulder, doesn't make her awareness obvious. Bruce can see her sneak one hand into her purse, but she's reasonably casual about the motion. Not bad at all.

He drops just as her pursuer rushes her, catches the man around the throat and maneuvers him neatly between Bruce and Lane, so that when she swings around, the first hiss of pepper spray is directed at him instead of Bruce.

It only hits the man in a line along the jaw; but judging by the noises he's making against the gloved palm Bruce has over his mouth, the capsaicin is still causing quite a burn. Bruce is close enough to feel a little tingle across his own skin, the leftover cloud in the air—and the cowl does have open eyeholes. He's going to have to make some adjustments for that.

"Well, that's not what I was expecting," Lane is saying, a little uneven. Her hand is still raised, the small spray canister at the ready; but she hasn't pressed down again, even though she's faced with a figure in black holding a struggling, groaning man by the neck. She backs up a step, but doesn't run—and then she says, more steadily, "It's you, isn't it?"

"Me," Bruce repeats, low.

The modulated growl doesn't seem to put her off, either. She's looking him over, head to shoulders—where the cape attaches—to arms, the slice of chest she can see around the man he's restraining, and then her gaze climbs back up to his eyes and she says, "You. The Bat. The—Gotham Batman."

The man in Bruce's grip jerks, panicked, and makes a harsh noise in the back of his throat, the capsaicin on his face apparently no longer the greatest source of concern for him. And at this point he's only going to be a distraction; Bruce presses in carefully, holds for a moment, and releases the choke the instant the man goes limp, easing him to the ground.

He stays crouched over the man for a moment, and then glances back up at Lane. Who still doesn't look particularly startled.

So the alien did say something to her, then.

"He told you."

"He told me," Lane agrees, and then, watching him steadily, she lowers the pepper spray in a slow deliberate movement and slides it back into her purse. "He didn't know who you are—he hasn't heard the stories. He's," and the corner of her mouth twists, wry, over her own word choice as she concludes, "from out of town."

"I'm aware," Bruce says, flat.

They look at each other for a moment, silent.

"Well?" Lane says at last. "What did you want to know?"

Bruce tilts his head, wary. He's done his research; almost right out of college, Lane had been let go from a position for refusing to reveal the identity of a source, under pressure not only from her bosses but from the state representative she'd broken the story on. That she'd volunteer information is—

Except she isn't volunteering anything, is she? Only inviting him to do so.

"That depends," Bruce settles on. "What will you tell me?"

Lane lifts a hand, tilts her palm—caught out, and willing to acknowledge it. "Nothing," she says. "Just wanted to know what you want to know. Didn't figure you for the type to give much away, considering—" and she gestures, a brief but expansive wave encompassing the cowl, the cape, the suit, even the man lying on the sidewalk between them, "but it was worth a shot."

Her tone is brisk, frank, not unfriendly. Probably one she's perfected for uncooperative sources, Bruce thinks. Because of course in her own way she's just as much a detective as Batman—and she couldn't have gotten as far as she has in her field without developing something of a knack for her own set of strategies and tactics. Even if she carries somewhat less equipment.

"Nothing," Bruce repeats, and glances down at the unconscious body on the ground.

"Wow, sure, because I've never been threatened before," Lane murmurs, raising an eyebrow. "I'm not going to tell you anything I don't want to tell you by choice. And even if you were planning to beat me up, you know better. If I scream, Superman will be here inside thirty seconds."

"Worth a shot," Bruce echoes, and Lane honest-to-god flashes him half a smile.

Then again, he supposes, presumably this is hardly the strangest conversation Lane has had since she's met Superman.

"And I don't figure you're the type to answer any of the other questions I might want to ask you, either," Lane continues. "So let's try something else. I'll tell you some things I think we both already know, and you can keep sitting there looking creepy and not saying anything. How's that sound?"

Bruce doesn't answer; but he doesn't leave, either, and after a moment Lane seems to interpret that precisely the way he means it.

"You don't like Superman," Lane says. "He told me about the cameras, that you've been watching him. He makes you nervous. You—how long have you been doing this? No, no, never mind," she interrupts herself, "I know, I said no questions. Bad habit. But you've been doing this for a long time; I've been hearing Gotham Bat stories for years. And Superman is—he's _serious_ for you.

"Because plenty of people have looked for you before. Perry sends interns he doesn't like after Gotham Bat stories because if they quit over a snipe hunt he doesn't have to fire them. You don't make waves, you don't leave evidence lying around—and now here you are, standing in the street, letting me talk to you. Something's changed the equation for you. What could have done that except Superman?

"Maybe you just want to make sure I'm not going to say anything. You'd already guessed that he said something to me about you, and you know I have the credibility to break stories nobody would believe if they came from someone else. But if that were all, you'd just have said it. No need to be evasive." Lane crosses her arms and tilts her head, thoughtful. "So it can't be that alone. Superman doesn't like you either, after that camera stunt; you can't just go talk to him. But there's something you need to know. There's something you need to know," Lane repeats again, more slowly, "and you need to know it now, even though it's been a year—" She cuts herself off, opens her mouth and then closes it again, and then says, "Is this about what happened at the gala?"

Bruce stays silent for a beat, just long enough to let Lane draw her own conclusions. And Lane does care about the alien, does want to protect him; the total lack of hesitation she's shown in promising Bruce he'll get nothing out of her, her certainty that Superman would come for her immediately if she called for him, say as much. Bruce had already understood the angle he would need to take.

But the words still taste bitter in his mouth, when he makes himself say, "What does Alexander Luthor, Jr., have against Superman?"

Lane stares at him. "Lex _Luthor_?" she repeats, and if her startlement is feigned then Bruce will hang up the Batsuit in the morning and never touch it again. "Wait—so it really wasn't Wayne after all?"

Bruce ruthlessly controls his own surprise—and Lane is hardly paying attention to him now anyway, rubbing a hand across her chin and narrowing her eyes as she gazes into the middle distance.

"I don't think they've ever even spoken to each other," she murmurs. "I'm not sure why Luthor would—but then I suppose Black Zero must have gotten his attention, too. And he doesn't like Wayne, either, so if he could embarrass Wayne Enterprises at the same time, why wouldn't he? I don't know why Keefe would go along with it, WE's been going the extra mile with employee care and compensation since the—"

"He doesn't think it's enough."

And that catches Lane, snaps her focus right back to Bruce's face. "He doesn't think it's enough?" she repeats.

Bruce closes his eyes—just for a moment, against the memory of all those scrawled red words.

He'd found out what Wally Keefe had meant by _you've been getting my notes, I hope_ ; he'd only had to ask, and the office had turned up a whole stack of checks. Nine months' worth, duly sent to Wally Keefe—he'd cashed a couple at the beginning, or someone else had cashed them for him while he was still healing; and then he'd started sending them back. The first had been blank, and the next two or three had just been scribbled out angrily, wordless. And then, on the next, in glaring ren pen: _WE ALL DIED THAT DAY B WAYNE_. The next, and the next, and the next. _YOU SAW I KNOW YOU SAW_. _WHY ARE YOU PRETENDING_. _I WON'T LET YOU FORGET_.

He doesn't say anything; but Lane doesn't need him to.

"He doesn't think it's enough," Lane says again, "and Luthor's—capitalizing on it. Using him." Her mouth presses tight, a little moue of disdain. "Well, I can't say that doesn't sound like something he'd do." She pauses for a moment, clearly still turning it all over in her mind; and then she looks at Bruce again. "And you?"

Bruce waits.

"What are you getting out of this?" Lane clarifies. "If I'd had to guess, I'd have expected you to be on Luthor's side—"

"I'm not on Luthor's side of anything," Bruce grits out.

"Oh, I see, it's a competition thing. If anybody's going to take down Superman, it's going to be you. Is that it?"

Reducing to absurdity—Bruce doesn't dignify it with a response. "He's up to something," he says instead. "Don't let him get away with it," and then he stands and looses a grapple in the same motion, and allows the retracting cable to draw him up and away into the dark.

"Well, that's just great," he hears Lane say below him, as he catches the toe of one boot on a cornice, unhooks the grapple, and swarms the rest of the way up the side of the building. "Guess I better call an ambulance for you, huh? What an exciting night this is turning out to be."

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Clark's made some pretty good progress with the ship, over the past week or so. He's slowly getting better at telling which configurations of light-streams are worth trying—even as he reaches for them, he can almost feel what might work, what definitely won't, and he's wrong less and less often.

(And it's not just in his head; when he asks, idle, it turns out the ship's been keeping track and can give him the exact percentage of improvement he's shown. Because of course it can.)

But he's still not really expecting it, the day he asks about the secondary data drive's operability and the ship says, "Yes."

Clark blinks and double-checks inside his head, and he wasn't wrong: there are still two or three streams of light-motes in there that are dull, deactivated.

"Are you sure?"

"Eighty-two percent of drive functionality restored," the ship clarifies. "Eighty-six percent of data detected is now intact. Operability thresholds exceeded."

Clark lies there on his back, staring up at the knot of light behind the wall, frozen—because he's been waiting for this so long that now that it's happened, he hardly knows what to do first. "Can you—the projection of Jor-El, is it there? Can you run it?"

The ship is silent for a moment, and then says, "Projection viable," and Clark skids out of the gap in the wall so fast his shirt rides halfway up his back, and jerks upright to find Jor-El looking placidly back at him.

And there is something a little off about it, if Clark looks closely. It's not quite as good a representation of a person as it was last time—not that it ever could have fooled Clark; he can tell there's no breath or heartbeat over there, can hear the soft shimmering tone the projection's energy field makes instead. But it's uneven, now, a doubled droning note wavering in and out intermittently. And Jor-El's clarity or—or resolution, sort of, is changing in time with it, solid enough to touch and then odd, insubstantial, graying out around the edges.

But he's _there_. He's there, and his calm face, that soft smile, are exactly the way Clark remembers them.

"Kal," he says.

Clark swallows. "I—wasn't sure I'd be able to get you back," he says.

And that makes Jor-El—Father?—smile just a little wider, enough to crinkle the broad friendly crow's-feet around the corners of his eyes. "You've done well," he says. "I appear to be nearly intact. Tell me: what happened? I was archived at the moment my original self was removed from this system. I remember nothing afterward."

Clark looks away. "Ship?"

"Integrating available records," the ship says coolly, and Jor-El's eyes drift closed. For a moment he's disturbingly, artificially still, presumably processing the update he's receiving; and then he blinks once, twice, and looks at Clark again, and his expression is grave and sober.

"I see," he says, very low.

"You knew General Zod, didn't you?" Clark says quickly. "Before all this. You knew him."

"Kal—"

"Explain it to me. Tell me about him. Why did he do it? Why wouldn't he listen to me? Why wouldn't he stop?" Clark's aware all at once that his breath's coming fast, his voice too loud, that he's firing the questions out more quickly than Jor-El could possibly answer them; he bites the inside of his cheek and squeezes his eyes shut, and after a moment he hears Jor-El sigh.

"Kal, you must understand: he knew no way but war."

"Oh, come on! What kind of excuse is that?"

"It is not an excuse," Jor-El says calmly. "It is the truth. You remember what I told you about the Codex?"

"You said it was—population control. That everyone had a predetermined role—"

"I said that every child was designed to fill a predetermined role," Jor-El corrects. "And I meant it. When it was determined that the House of Zod should be permitted to create a new member, Dru-Zod was constructed for the express purpose of joining the warrior guild when he came of age. If it had only been the artisan guild or the mediator guild who had secured the right to increase their number—I doubt I can explain to you how wholly altered Dru-Zod would have been, how different a design the Codex would have generated for the House of Zod."

"But the Codex can't possibly decide everything," Clark says slowly.

"No," Jor-El concedes. "But it decides enough. Dru-Zod was told his purpose as soon as he was old enough to understand what it meant; he was shaped, trained, guided on every step of his path. Every genetic predisposition he had been given by the Codex was duly cultivated as intended. If there had been a choice, could he have chosen differently? I cannot say; he had none, and wanted none."

Clark bites his lip. "One of the others," he says, "Faora-Ul—she said they were stronger than I was because they had no morality. I thought she meant that they'd decided as much. That they intended to complete their mission no matter what the cost might be. But they—did she—did you _make_ them that way?"

Jor-El is silent. He looks down at his clasped hands for a long moment, so long that Clark almost thinks he's running another processing sequence; and then he says quietly, "Kal, there was much about our world that was beautiful. When we turned our efforts toward wisdom, toward art, toward justice—what we made was incredible. But we were imperfect. We erred, we committed wrongs; and where there are wrongs there is ugliness.

"In the centuries before the Codex was refined, our age of expansion was coming to an end. We were embroiled in conflict. There were no more empty worlds within our reach, and Krypton was not the only realm that wished to touch faraway stars."

"You wouldn't have had a warriors' guild," Clark murmurs, "if you hadn't had any wars to fight."

"Just so," Jor-El agrees, soft. "By the time we'd reached the final stages of the Codex's development, it was considered a kindness to construct warriors who could not, in hurting others, hurt themselves."

Clark swallows. It doesn't do much to ease the sharp taste of bile rising at the back of his throat. He's thought about it a lot, since Black Zero: the way the bones of Zod's neck had just— _given_ under his hands, the sudden horrible slackness; the way he'd clutched at Lois after. And he—he has wished, sometimes, that it had been easier. He's lain in bed alone, staring up through the dark, and wondered distantly whether it wouldn't have been better if he'd just snapped Zod's spine the moment they'd met on the ship; if he'd only been the kind of person who could do that, clear-eyed, without hesitating, how many more people would be alive right now? How many lives had been lost, just because he couldn't stomach the thought of it until he'd had no other choice—just because he was _weak_ —

He wants to tell Jor-El that it makes no sense to him, that he can't imagine what they'd been thinking when they'd set up the Codex that way.

But it wouldn't quite be the truth.

"So—so that's how he was made," he says aloud. "To think that way about people. To—not care what he did, or whether it was wrong."

"The warriors' guild was governed by a code of honor," Jor-El says. "We made them loyal, we made them strong; they loved Krypton and her people. They fought bravely, they did not surrender—we did not design them to accept the possibility of defeat. We did not design them to despair. Half a dozen of them against a _world_ , Kal, and they did not falter.

"I do not ask you to forgive them. Their paths were their own. Choice was not eliminated, for them—but it was limited, and in ways that you, as an unconstructed and natural birth, cannot wholly understand."

Clark scrubs a hand through his hair, down the nape of his neck. He doesn't understand, not yet—but maybe he can if he tries. "Okay. Okay, well—tell me more about the guilds, then. I want to know how they worked. Before the Codex, and then after, and—and how the Codex's priorities were determined. Tell me everything."

 

 

 

It turns out to be a bit of a tall order—obviously Jor-El doesn't get any more tired than Clark, doesn't need to rest or sit down or get a drink of water; he can talk all night. But thousands of years of Kryptonian history, the entire philosophical and cultural context of a society that spanned star systems, isn't the kind of thing that can be summed up in time for Clark to get to work.

He's only half an hour late, but that's fifteen minutes later than Clark Kent has ever been.

(Clark tries to be carefully irregular, five minutes early one day and ten minutes late the next, the way someone who couldn't break the sound barrier might be. But he's never _irresponsible_ about it.)

When he steps into the office, Lois is leaning against his desk—and he didn't think he'd made any arrangements with her for today, but the way she's crossed her arms, the quick absent tap of her foot, says otherwise.

"I'm so sorry, Lo," he says in a rush when she catches sight of him, before she can do more than open her mouth. "Did I forget something? I didn't mean to be late, I just—uh, I got a little bit caught up, and I—"

"No, no, Smallville, nothing like that," she says; but her steady stare doesn't match her smile, and a second later she reaches up as if to swipe a little stray lint from her neckline, and—

Oh: her fingertips are tracing out a broad S just below her collarbone.

"I just need to talk to you for a minute," she adds, and Clark nods, arranges his face into something sheepish, and follows her out to the stairwell that leads up to the roof.

The moment the door's swung shut behind them, she turns and grabs his elbow. "Anybody?"

"What?" Clark says. "No, there's—the nearest person is that guy from Accounting we passed on the stairs—"

"That jerk from Accounting," Lois corrects him crisply. "Never forget, never forgive."

"Okay, that jerk from Accounting we passed on the stairs," Clark duly repeats. "Please tell me we're not here to talk about him."

"No, no," Lois says, and then her face does something weird and complicated, and her fingers tighten on his arm. "Your—friend came to talk to me last night."

"My—what?"

"Your _friend_. With the ears?"

For a moment, Clark can't place the reference; and then all at once he remembers the conversation, telling Lois about the shadowy figure from the rooftop, right before they'd gotten interrupted by the phone call from the mayor's office. And—wait a second. "He did _what_?"

"He came to talk to me," Lois says briskly, unworried, as if that isn't the most infuriating thing she's ever heard. "I meant to tell you: he's a bit of a phenomenon in Gotham, your friend, but he doesn't usually let anybody get a good look at him. The Bat—that's what they call him, most of the time. The Batman.

"And it isn't that I trust him, exactly, but he thinks there's something suspicious about what happened at the gala, too—"

"I told you, it wasn't Wayne—"

"No, I know," Lois says. "Or, I mean—it could have been. It was a perfectly reasonable conclusion to draw. But your friend doesn't think it was Wayne, either, and depending on what turns up after I've checked a few things out, I might agree with him. There's something going on, Clark. I don't know what yet, and I don't think your friend does either, but you need to be careful. All right?"

She's looking at him with wide, worried eyes—and she must be itching to check out whatever lead she's considering, but she's put that on hold just to talk to him, which means a little something extra coming from Lois.

"Okay," Clark says, "okay," and he folds his hands around one of hers and smiles at her. "I'll be careful."

Lois stares at him searchingly, and then sighs. "After you go find Batman and yell at him," she concludes.

"I told him to leave me alone," Clark says. "He shouldn't have come anywhere near you. I know you like people who give you mysteries to solve, Lo, but he's not on my side here."

"He's not on Luthor's side, either," Lois says.

Clark blinks. "Luthor—Lex Luthor? What does he have to do with this?"

"That's the part I don't know yet," Lois tells him, crisp, and pats him on the back of the hand. "We'll figure it out. Just—"

"—be careful," Clark repeats, "I know. I will." _After I go find Batman and yell at him_ , he doesn't say, but judging by the fond, sage look on Lois's face, she heard it anyway.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

It's almost a pleasure, Bruce finds, to face a problem that might be solvable.

He's not going to let himself lose sight of the bigger picture. It's not that Superman isn't a high priority; it's not that Bruce doesn't remain committed to finding some way to contain him or defend against him. But after a year of grinding away relentlessly at it, becoming ever more aware of how hopelessly, toweringly outmatched he may be—

(Bruce Wayne is the one who's incompetent, useless. Batman is supposed to be different. When Bruce is helpless, it's supposed to be deliberate.)

With this, the stakes aren't even particularly high. Yes, he wants to understand what Luthor's goals might be, how Luthor intends to pursue them. Yes, depending on Luthor's approach, there is some potential for collateral damage; there may be a need for Bruce to intervene. But it's not a threat to Bruce or to Batman directly. It isn't as—as _personal_ as Superman, and Bruce feels correspondingly less of the grim driving urgency that's made it so impossible for him to find his footing. With this, at last, he's in control again; and there's an undeniable satisfaction in that fact.

His tentative conclusion is that Luthor has some sort of PR maneuver in mind, in which Wally Keefe is intended to play a part. And while other details are thin on the ground at the moment, there are two corollaries that present themselves immediately: Luthor will need an event likely to draw a crowd, press coverage, or both; and Luthor will need Superman.

Natural disasters are too unpredictable—Luthor can't count on one to occur when he's ready for it, won't be able to orchestrate events around it. Some sort of public event or another would be much more straightforward as a staging ground, in Bruce's estimation, and Superman is just as likely to show up, if a sufficiently sizeable crisis occurs.

He does a little research, checks with a few sources in various city and state offices, draws up a timeline. Limited to the next six to eight months, at least for the moment; he'll pull together a secondary assessment later of any prospects that pop up further out, but their thankfully-rare business dealings have never given Bruce the impression that Luthor is a particularly patient man. And it's been a year already.

Superman-related, high-profile, or an easy target: three out of three will go right to the top of the list, two out of three will be designated possible but less likely. Bruce plugs the data in, runs the analysis, and examines the preliminary results.

Not bad. He'd expected to need to do a little more tweaking, maybe adjust the weighting of his criteria a few times; but the events whose Luthor Risk Quotients have come out on top seem to have ordered themselves reasonably well.

The highest is a perfect three out of three—the public unveiling of the statue of Superman that's going up in the newly-rechristened Heroes Park, now that the rubble's all been cleared away. Superman-related, high-profile, and definitely an easy target; the city organizers are anticipating quite a crowd, and it's impossible to enforce sufficient security standards in an open area like that. Even if Superman won't be the guest of honor this time around, he'll undoubtedly be keeping an eye on things. All Luthor has to do is call in a bomb threat and the alien will come running.

The next two are a rung down, two out of three, but so heavily weighted they've tipped across the threshold into the top category anyway. And after a moment, Bruce can see why.

One is an international diplomatic summit being held in Metropolis, a few weeks after the statue—high-profile is an understatement, it'll be making the news all around the world, and security's going to be better than the park, but it's a much more attractive target. To extremists of all kinds, not just Luthor. And the other—

After a moment's uncertainty, Bruce had gone ahead and created a separate weighting factor attached solely to instances of Lois Lane's name. _If I scream, Superman will be here inside thirty seconds._ Bruce had gone to Lane, when he couldn't get to Superman; surely it might well occur to Luthor to do the same.

And that added weight has catapulted what might otherwise have been a footnote up to the top of the list. It wouldn't even be on the list at all except that Bruce has access to the Daily Planet's internal servers, to upcoming assignments and travel plans for every Daily Planet reporter going abroad at any point in the next year—and that includes Lane, who's secured tentative arrangements to travel to Nairomi in approximately six months' time.

Bruce stares at the entry. Superman-related; and not high-profile, but definitely an easy target. Long-term instability in the area, either escalating toward or already a civil war, depending on who you talk to—and Lane's headed right into the middle of it, an agreement sketched out with none other than General Amajagh himself for an interview.

It would be irresponsible to discount the possibility that Lane is working with Luthor. She could have been lying, could have faked her startled bewilderment; she might fear or resent Superman, might be playing along because he'd taken an interest in her and she had no other option—or hadn't had one until Lex Luthor had come along.

But Bruce can't convince himself that it's particularly likely. She'd seemed genuinely protective of the alien, and nothing so much as intrigued by the possibility that Luthor was involved. Which fits everything Bruce knows about Lane. So if it had been an act, it had been a very good one. Much more probable, then, that she'll be an unwitting target. Given the circumstances, it'll hardly be difficult for Luthor to arrange some sort of incident; and overseas, no one else on the ground to fact-check, any narrative Luthor preferred could be made to emerge from the ashes.

 

 

 

Bruce is systematic, painstaking, in laying the groundwork.

The diplomatic summit presents the most challenges; for the moment, the most he can do is fire off a few messages to those of his contacts who might be tangentially involved in making the arrangements, or might know someone who is. If he can secure a trustworthy source of inside intelligence, he can keep an eye out for leaks—check any information that escapes against what he knows to be true, and potentially ensure that Luthor remains _mis_ informed.

He can be a little more proactive about Lane. Her plans aren't set in stone; the situation in Nairomi is too volatile for anything to be finalized this far out. But as it stands, her transportation choices all check out. There's no obvious connection between Luthor and the military base with the airfield where Lane will be coming in, and both of her options from there—a military helicopter for the first leg, and a UN-affiliated local contact who's willing to take her in blindfolded the rest of the way—hold up to Bruce's scrutiny. Of course, any alterations will be suspect; but he'll have to wait for Luthor to make a move before he'll know for sure.

The only other variable involved is Lane's photographer. Unlike Lane, James Olsen is an unknown: Bruce has no idea what his attitude toward Superman might be, whether Luthor might have made contact with him or have something on him, or is just plain paying him off. A superficial examination of publicly available information doesn't suggest much of anything; Olsen doesn't appear to have bought anything unusually expensive recently, has no particularly shadowy periods of his life that seem likely to have generated blackmail material.

But it's impossible to be sure. Bruce will have to make arrangements to monitor him for a while, to assess whether Luthor has made or is likely to make an approach.

And as for the statue—Bruce rubs absently at his jaw, considering. By far the easiest way to do it would be to place some surveillance equipment. Something a little clumsier than his usual, even; something that might conceivably have been placed by the city to deter vandalism ahead of such a public event.

Except, of course, Superman's damaged ship is still lying right where it came down, at the park's far edge.

Bruce has never been able to determine with any real certainty whether the alien is accessing the ship regularly. The camera network hadn't extended quite that far before Superman destroyed it, and as best Bruce can tell, no reliable eyewitness has ever seen him entering or exiting—though of course there's no way they'd be able to, if the alien used his speed. A faint breeze, an impression of brief shimmering blue; hardly much to go on.

For the first month or two after Black Zero, all the marked-off construction zones in the world hadn't been able to prevent people from trying to get closer, though most of them hadn't made it very far. Once the rubble had all been cleared away and a much less generous perimeter marked off to keep civilians out of the research installation, a semipermanent crowd had formed, huddled masses waiting for a glimpse of Superman.

But after three weeks, four, five, of nothing, the numbers had thinned. Superman wasn't going anywhere, and had been seen, met in person, across dozens of accident scenes all over the city—hanging around the ship clearly wasn't a particularly good way to get a look at him. Bruce hooked himself into the research facility's feed months ago, and if the alien's been paying visits, it hasn't been to that section of the ship.

Bruce does have enough images, catalogued and timestamped, to say without a doubt that the ship is undergoing some kind of repair procedure. The damage to its hull has unmistakably diminished in multiple areas, and vanished entirely in places. And it's entirely possible that the ship is doing that on its own, without any assistance or instructions whatsoever from Superman.

But he doesn't particularly want to bet the success of this endeavor on it. And if the alien _is_ there, presumably even a single glimpse of the Bat will have him scouring the park for cameras. Which means that if this is going to work, Bruce Wayne will have to go instead. Superman doesn't like Bruce Wayne any better than he likes Batman, at this point; but he doesn't associate Bruce Wayne with hidden surveillance. He'll be irritated, perhaps even angry—but he won't be on his guard.

And if there's something strangely tempting about the thought, if Bruce feels something like grim satisfaction welling up, well, that's

(—only to be expected; how could he not? How could he not want to stand within arm's reach of that terrible figure, that frigidly beautiful face? How could he pretend it had been anything other than electrifying, the prickle of awareness that all that impossible power, that ineffable attention, had been fixed inexorably on him and him alone—?)

hardly anything to cancel an essential mission over.

 

 

 

It takes nearly as much time as putting on the Batsuit might have, in the end; Bruce finds himself repeatedly distracted by the process of dressing. Something about the combination of sliding on and buttoning dress shirt, vest, jacket, choosing and folding a pocket square and smoothing it into place, knowing that in some sense he's doing it all for Superman, and it

(—changes the whole feel of the thing somehow, doing all this with the hazy thought of Superman's eyes on him later in the back of his mind, that piercing blue stare, strange crackling—

—apprehension, it must be apprehension, at the thought of that distant assessing gaze following the lines of his body, those broad strong hands outstretched. That palm against his in that goddamn handshake, careful, gentle, and a lie: those fingers could tear through all these layers in an instant and strip him bare—)

doesn't matter, it doesn't make any sense that that should matter. He puts the thought out of his mind and decides against a tie, leaves the collar of the shirt unfastened over the bare hollow of his throat. No sense in giving the alien a handy noose to strangle him by; and a louche, careless air in a suit this expensive is only appropriate for Bruce Wayne.

Once he's satisfied with his appearance, he rechecks the cameras he'll be carrying. A larger, simpler design than the Mark 8s he'd developed for the ill-fated surveillance net, except in one critical respect: all he has to do is toss them, easy idle motions, Bruce Wayne drunkenly swinging his arms, and they'll reorient in midair and attach themselves to the nearest suitable fixture. Streetlights should work just fine, both for elevation and as a source to siphon off a little electricity.

Alfred's step comes on the stair just as he's wrapping things up. "Sir, if you've a moment—" and then he falls silent, and Bruce glances up and is met with the full glory of one particularly skeptical raised eyebrow. "Going out tonight, Master Wayne?" Alfred murmurs, in a tone now much more amused than brisk.

"Something's come up," Bruce tells him. "I won't be long."

"As you say, sir." Alfred clears his throat delicately. "I only meant to inform you—it appears someone has been conducting a very thorough test of our network security. Generously assuming it isn't you trying to bring down the entire system—"

"I did agree to warn you in advance before doing that again," Bruce mutters.

"—I thought perhaps you'd like to know," Alfred concludes, as if Bruce hadn't spoken.

Bruce considers this for a moment. "Any immediate danger?"

"Not as such," Alfred says. "If I may offer my subjective opinion, sir: it seems as though our anonymous visitor is—curious, rather than hostile. Their technical capabilities are fair, but not staggering. I doubt they could cause much harm even if they wished it, and they don't seem to wish it."

"You always were an optimist," Bruce says, looking away. On the one hand—this is hardly the time to recklessly assume the best, given the attention Batman has been drawing lately. On the other hand, Bruce has never doubted Alfred's tactical assessments and isn't about to start now; if Alfred doesn't think their _visitor_ will be able to cause any particularly severe damage, then Bruce is prepared to treat it as fact. "In that case, I'll leave it to you to decide how to handle it."

"Because you'll be—busy," Alfred murmurs leadingly, one eyebrow climbing again.

Bruce shoots him Bruce Wayne's smuggest smile, and tosses a wink into the bargain. "Don't wait up."

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Clark dives through the air with a scowl that probably shouldn't be on Superman's face—but nobody can see him up here, and he's _frustrated_.

Because he's got nothing. With all that he can see and hear, everything he can observe, it should have been easy for him to find the Gotham Batman again. It wouldn't take much: the swish of that cape, the clump of a boot where no boot should be—even that silhouette, that slim black hovercraft, blocking out the city lights again.

But he's been poking around Gotham for almost an hour now, and he's got nothing. He did take the opportunity to prevent a couple of muggings, intercede in what had seemed primed to turn into a shootout in a dark warehouse. And he couldn't help but notice the way everybody who'd seen him had flinched from the shadow of him; but then the blue and red weren't as visible, this late at night. Cape, suit, Gotham—he had to look like the Bat, to them.

(That was its own kind of frustrating, too, that anybody could look at both of them and find them interchangeable. Clark's not like that, skulking around, being creepy and mysterious and short-tempered. Except—

Except that he sort of is right now. But that's different. Extenuating circumstances.)

Maybe the Bat doesn't come out every night. Lois had told him a little bit more, and then he'd googled and found—well. Not much. Conspiracy theories, urban legends, people passing around stories about how their mother's friend's neighbor had totally seen something one time. Clark knows he's real, but Clark has some pretty distinct advantages over your average Gotham resident. And whoever he is, he can't have stayed that low-profile by being predictable.

Last-ditch, Clark does a quick check of the Metropolis side of the bay on his way back to the ship, just in case. That's where he'd first met Batman, after all. The guy does leave Gotham sometimes.

By the time he reaches the park, though, he's about ready to give up—and then all at once he stops short in the air. That's a heartbeat, footsteps. All the researchers are usually gone by this hour. But on the ground? Surely it can't be Batman—

And then Clark drops close enough to catch a quick flash of light: the reflection of a park streetlamp off a cufflink, of all things. Not Batman; Bruce Wayne.

Great. That's exactly what this night needed.

Clark stifles a sigh and carefully arranges his expression into something more appropriate to Superman. Placid—and maybe a little chilly, but Wayne can hardly pretend to be surprised about that. And then he touches down with a whoosh, hovering for the barest instant before he lets the soles of his uniform boots come to rest on the pavement.

Wayne must hear him coming; he's already turning, glancing over, as Clark comes down. He doesn't startle. Doesn't even take his hands out of the pockets of his slacks. He just looks at Clark, face amiable and vaguely inquiring, as if it's curious, marginally interesting, that Superman should be here—and as if it's perfectly reasonable that he himself should be standing around in Heroes Park at this hour, half a dozen strides from the very clearly fenced-off security perimeter around the research installation.

"Mr. Wayne," Clark says flatly. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Oh, you know," Wayne says with a shrug, tilting his head back to look up at the bulk of the ship overhead. "Figured maybe you had a point."

"A point," Clark repeats.

Wayne grins, lazy. "When you said I ought to get to know you better. You had a point."

"I—don't think I said that, Mr. Wayne." And if he had, he hadn't made it sound like that—

"Details," Wayne murmurs, withdrawing one hand from a pocket long enough to dismiss the whole question with an expansive wave. "I figured if I wanted to learn more about you, this had to be the best place to do it."

"While I'm sure you'd make a fascinating addition to the research team if you put your mind to it," Clark says, in Superman's flat mild tones, "I don't believe you currently have the authorization to enter that area—"

Wayne shrugs again. "Oh, I imagine I could pull a couple strings, arrange myself a little tour. Or," he adds, "you could just let me in."

" _I_ could."

"Why not? It's your ship, isn't it?"

It's not a real question, not coming from Wayne, but Clark still hesitates. It's Kryptonian, he's helped it, he might even sort of be friends with it—but it feels like a leap to call it his. The pod he'd come in, that had been his; but the scout ship was here for so long before him, had been on its own all that time. It doesn't seem right to claim he's in charge of it, especially when it knows so much more than he does. And there's something almost deceptive about calling it his as though he'd brought it with him, when there's so much more to it.

He glances up and Wayne is watching him—stance casual, shoulders relaxed, the shadow of that smug grin still lingering around the mouth, and yet there's a sharpness to his gaze, his eyes.

"If it's anyone's, it's mine," Clark allows. "But I didn't bring it here."

And that makes Wayne's jaw tense. Just for an instant, a split second, before he's careless and smiling again.

"Didn't you? I admit I was a little distracted by all the buildings trying to fall on me, but I seem to recall—"

"I'm the reason it ended up in Metropolis," Clark amends. "But General Zod is the one who took it and flew it here. I didn't—" and he's faltering, cracking in a way Superman shouldn't, but he hates thinking about it, hates remembering— "I didn't mean for it to crash. Or—or any of the rest of it. I didn't mean for that to happen. That wasn't what I wanted."

"Yes," Wayne murmurs. "Yes, you do keep saying that."

The slick false friendliness of his tone is a jab—and one Clark should have been expecting, but he's frustrated by it anyway. "The ship came here a long time ago," he snaps, and he probably shouldn't be telling any of this to Wayne, but if Wayne wants to know more about Superman, then he can damn well stand there and listen for a minute. "It was a survey vessel, a scout ship. But it was left behind—abandoned."

"A scout ship," Wayne repeats, gaze going sharp again.

And all at once, Clark can guess why. _You don't know anything about me_ —and he'd meant it, when he said it, but he hadn't realized quite how true it was. He's been pressing Jor-El to tell him everything, to explain it all to him, feeling lost and confused and like he needed to know more; and Wayne knows even less than he does. Wayne knows—Wayne knows _nothing_ , Wayne saw the Black Zero and the World Engine drop out of the sky and Metropolis smashing apart around him, and how else can he make sense of it? He doesn't have a ship, a Jor-El, to ask.

All he has is Superman.

Superman, who he doesn't like, doesn't trust, but is standing in front of out here in the middle of the night, badgering for answers. In a weird and very Bruce Wayne sort of way, it's almost—brave.

"It was sent thousands of years ago," Clark tells him. "General Zod didn't have anything to do with that. And neither did I."

Wayne raises an eyebrow. "So how did you get here, then, if you don't mind my asking?"

"You care whether I mind?" Clark inquires, mild.

Wayne grins, sharp-edged. "You caught me: not especially."

And Superman can't roll his eyes at people; but Clark shakes his head a little, sighs short and sharp through his nose. Of course. "I came in a pod, when I was a child. A personal capsule. There was a component, part of its drive mechanism, that was necessary to—defeat Zod's followers." Somehow he doesn't think Wayne's looking for a lecture on the physics of the Phantom Zone. Not that Clark's particularly qualified to give one, since he only understood about half of the ship's explanation anyway. "It was destroyed in the process."

He pauses, looks away; at the time he'd barely hesitated, but it gives him a bit of a pang, now. All the time he'd spent thinking about that little pod, once Dad had finally shown it to him—looking at it, poking around in it, taking the least essential sections apart and then figuring out how to put them back together. He hadn't known about the scout ship, then; he'd thought the pod was all he'd ever have, this one other thing that had made the trip with him, all the way from wherever he'd come from. And now it's gone. For a greater good, and it isn't that he regrets it, but—he wishes it hadn't had to be that way.

Then again, he wishes that about a lot of things.

He glances back at Wayne, and he's expecting more of Wayne's deliberate blandness, maybe some staring or maybe an insult. He's not expecting Wayne's brows to have drawn down so sharply, or the briefly soft, surprised shape to Wayne's mouth.

"You were—a child," Wayne says slowly.

And again, Clark's caught flat-footed. He supposes General Zod hadn't really provided much of a frame of reference; _for some time_ could mean almost anything, a few months or a few years. There couldn't have been any reason for Wayne to hear that and understand that what it really meant was _for a lifetime, for as long as he can remember; he's never known any world but yours_ —

"Yes," Clark says aloud. "Yes, I was." And he can't help but wonder— "What did you think? That Zod had sent me ahead of him? That I was one of his warriors? And now I've eliminated him and I'm just biding my time—"

Wayne shrugs, careless. "I hadn't really thought about it that much," he says; and every line of his body supports that, the way he's standing and the bland incurious look on his face, but Clark is suddenly sure he's lying. Confronting Superman at that gala, and showing up here—just to find out more, he'd said as much. And the startlement in his expression, when he'd learned Clark had come here as a baby. Why should he be startled, unless he'd already come up with another explanation he'd assumed was correct?

Bullshit, Clark thinks slowly. Bullshit, he hasn't really thought about it that much.

"Sure," Clark murmurs. "And it also didn't occur to you that it might be a little dangerous to walk up to me and tell me what you think of me, when I could—how did you put it? 'Burn the whole world down'."

"More dangerous than existing on the same planet with you?" Wayne says. "Hardly. You could murder me in my sleep whenever you wanted. The most I'm doing by coming here is making it a little less inconvenient for you."

His tone is blasé, just a little wry, and he's holding up one hand, thumb and forefinger nearly touching, to illustrate the magnitude of that inconvenience. He doesn't intend for Clark to take it seriously. But—

"Still," Clark says. "You're trusting me with your life, Mr. Wayne. I do understand that, and I appreciate it."

Wayne stares at him, abruptly unreadable. "I'm sure," he says at last, very flat, and then raises an eyebrow. "So an interstellar stork just dropped you on our doorstep, is that it? Left you on a strange planet with no way home—"

"Earth _is_ my home, Mr. Wayne," Clark says, shaking his head a little. "And even if I felt otherwise, I couldn't go back. There was a catastrophe; the planet was destroyed. My biological parents were barely able to save me. General Zod and his followers, they were—they were the only others left." Clark glances away, because he doesn't particularly want to know what Wayne's reaction is going to be, and yet he can't quite stop himself from saying— "I'm alone now."

He braces himself for smug satisfaction, from Wayne, or grim delight— _oh, well, it's good to know we only have one left to worry about_. But Wayne is silent for a long beat instead, long enough that Clark can't help looking at him again. And he's just—watching Clark, gaze dark and steady on Clark's face.

"I'm hurt," he says at last, light.

Clark blinks.

Wayne raises his eyebrows and wiggles his fingers, a tiny pointed wave. "'Alone' hardly seems like the word, when I'm standing right in front of you. What am I, chopped liver?"

It's—ridiculous, inane. Clark obviously didn't mean it literally, or at least not _that_ literally, and it's childish and petty of Wayne to have deliberately missed the point in such a stupid way just for the sake of argument.

So it doesn't make any sense that Clark should find himself huffing half a laugh out his nose, that the corner of his mouth should be tugging up like it is. "My sincerest apologies, Mr. Wayne. How thoughtless of me."

"To err is human," Wayne says—and then stops, mouth twisting ruefully; and once he realizes why, that does make Clark laugh.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

It doesn't make a difference, seeing Superman like this.

It doesn't. It shouldn't.

It can't.

Even if Superman isn't lying, isn't telling Bruce precisely what Bruce would find most reassuring to hear, that hardly makes him any less of a threat. If there are no others of his species, if he's eliminated them all, then they won't be coming to retrieve him, which constitutes one potential solution removed from contention; and if his home planet has been destroyed, then the odds of convincing him to leave Earth and go back are obviously not good. That's what matters.

And for all Bruce knows, Superman's biological parents took plenty of precautions before they launched their infant son at a distant world. He could have been designed to—to look the way he does, to smile with such abrupt and unselfconscious warmth, to dimple just so when he laughs. Even if Bruce were, hypothetically, inclined to call any of it disarming—

He can't allow it. He can't let himself be disarmed; he can't afford to permit himself to be rendered vulnerable. Superman might be deliberately endeavoring to elicit sympathy, and that means Bruce can't give it to him. Or, of course, what Bruce is feeling now might be the earliest stages of some sort of telepathic or empathic control, a gradual buildup of influence over time that will eventually allow the alien to exercise greater and greater sway over Bruce's thoughts and decisions.

Bruce can't rule it out. And anything that can't be ruled out must be accounted for strategically, must be included in any tactical assessment. That's all there is to it.

"Well, I do hope you'll forgive me," Superman is saying wryly, a hint of that brilliant smile still playing around his mouth. "But I'm afraid I'm not going to call you divine for it, Mr. Wayne."

"No," Bruce agrees, and it is what Bruce Wayne would say, it is; there shouldn't be a shiver of distant heat clawing at the base of his spine, listening to himself tell Superman in his smuggest drawl, "People mostly don't until after I've taken my pants off."

Superman's eyebrows jump the barest fraction—and then all at once he seems to remember himself, and his face is once again grave, neatly composed. "No need to demonstrate, I assure you," he says evenly.

"On the first date? I wouldn't dream of it," Bruce says, in a tone that of course implies the opposite. The leer he follows up with makes Superman frown, brief and uncomfortable, and that's exactly how it should be. That's exactly what he wants.

"Your sense of restraint is admirable, Mr. Wayne," Superman says shortly, and he's already six inches up in the air when he does. "Please don't break into the research facility; I'll be listening for it, and I will remove you from the premises if necessary. Good night," and then he's higher, higher, drifting effortlessly up; and then he turns in the air and extends his arms and is abruptly distant, gone, in a rush of wind.

Bruce stands there in the quiet, after, and gazes up absently at the ship.

A success, overall. Bruce Wayne has managed to extract more intelligence from Superman over the course of two interactions than Batman had managed in a year—by walking up and asking, of all things. His goals remain the same: to prevent whatever incident Luthor is intending to orchestrate, and not for Superman's sake but simply for its own, because collateral damage is more likely than not; and to do whatever is necessary to ensure that Superman cannot cause any more undue harm, that nothing like Black Zero can ever happen again.

And the goals may be dual but the reasoning is singular. No one else will be hurt, no one else will die, due to the alien's presence on Earth. Not if Bruce can prevent it—and he'll go to any lengths required to ensure that he can.

Anything else is inconsequential.

 

 


	4. Don't hold on too long.

 

 

**Don't hold on too long.**

_Shake up and down no more than two or three times; avoid clinging or excessive pumping. Lingering or dwelling needlessly over the act of a handshake can make your partner feel self-conscious or awkward—and it'll be an embarrassing faux pas for you!_

 

There's no indication that Luthor's timetable is particularly rushed. If anything, it's the opposite; no one had intended for Wally Keefe to interact with Superman this early. Bruce has reason to believe that he can, to some degree, take his time.

The monitors in Heroes Park were not only successfully placed, but can be thoroughly tested. Bruce manages to make contact with a source in the office responsible for orchestrating the security arrangements for the diplomatic summit. And a week is more than enough time for him to cultivate a certain familiarity with James Olsen's daily routine.

It helps that Olsen is a little less active than Lane. He's more often being sent to accompany reporters with stories assigned in advance, and therefore less likely to leave the Daily Planet office alone on the trail of a sudden lead. And the number of people he interacts with is smaller, the list of names more manageable—and any outliers will therefore be more visible.

Or at least they should be, if there are any. Even if Olsen actually is the weak link Luthor is planning to exploit, it's entirely possible that no contact has yet been made. There's been no sign of it yet; Olsen works hard, stays late, sleeps in at every opportunity, and generally seems to lead a wholly unsuspicious life. He's still the best in Luthor has for Nairomi, but Luthor may not choose to pursue that particular avenue at all.

Another few days, perhaps, and then Bruce will downgrade to a less intensive surveillance level. But for the moment, night has fallen, and Olsen is still in the Planet office—which means it's high time Bruce headed out and escorted him home, so to speak.

Bruce doesn't get too close. Metropolis is so clean; the bigger streets downtown by the Planet building are so well-lit. Even in the dark, the Bat feels a little more conspicuous here. But he doesn't have to wait long before he sees Olsen step out of the office at last, and—

Hmm. Olsen's glancing back and forth, jittery. Bruce shifts his weight a little, preparatory, because Olsen doesn't usually pause this long outside the doors before he starts walking; and, sure enough, when Olsen does move it's not in the same direction as usual.

"Hmm," comes Alfred's murmur in Bruce's ear, and Bruce allows himself a very small smile. "Interesting. What do you think, sir? Is our Mr. Olsen simply yearning for a change in scenery?"

"Little nervous for that," Bruce mutters.

"Late for an appointment," Alfred muses. "Going on a date. Which I imagine he _doesn't_ do with his pockets full of surveillance equipment—"

Bruce snorts, deliberate, just loud enough for the microphone to pick up. "Some people lack creativity," he growls, and then spreads his arms and leaps.

If Olsen's engagement is social, it's unusual: he weaves off down smaller and smaller side streets, picks his way through less and less appealing alleys. It does make Bruce's life easier—the further they go, the more streetlights are out. Bruce can stick a little closer, keep above Olsen instead of trailing as far behind, and in the end he sees the man waiting for Olsen before Olsen does.

Mostly because no one in a suit like that has any reason to be hanging around in a neighborhood like this—this close to the docks, all grime and shadows. Or at least no one in a suit like that has any reason that isn't somehow related to organized crime.

Olsen's still looking over his shoulder every few strides, glancing back and forth hurriedly. It takes a minute for his eyes to settle on the figure ahead of him. And then he hustles forward in a rush, and hisses, "You're the guy?"

"I'm the guy," the man says, with a businesslike little smile.

"I, uh," Olsen says, and then he does at least have the good sense to add, "Can I see—some ID or something?"

"Of course, Mr. Olsen," the man says, even and soothing, and Bruce peers down at the badge he produces and carefully doesn't laugh out loud.

"CIA," Alfred says. " _Really_."

Olsen could be forgiven for believing it, Bruce supposes; he was right to ask for the badge, but he has no way to know what a real one should look like, and the replica he's being shown isn't _that_ bad. Besides, Bruce is privy to the knowledge that Luthor's hand might be directing this sequence of events. Olsen can't possibly be aware of it, and considering that he _is_ aware he's going to be headed to a foreign country on the brink of revolution in less than a year—it's not impossible. A photographer would be a potentially useful intelligence asset. Olsen has no reason to assume anything else is afoot.

At least not until Bruce drops into position and catches the "CIA" agent with a forearm around the throat.

"Holy shit!"

And, indeed, the supposed agent is hardly a professional—taken by surprise, he thrashes, kicks out in entirely the wrong direction, and thereby loses both half his footing and any chance he had of retaining a stance appropriate to flip Bruce. In a matter of moments, he's down in a heap at Bruce's feet, the fake badge he'd still been holding out toward Olsen skittering off to one side.

"Holy shit," Olsen repeats breathlessly. "Did you just—did you just kill a CIA agent? Jesus Christ—"

"He wasn't CIA," Bruce growls.

"He wasn't—he—who are _you_?"

"Did he give you anything?"

"What?" Olsen says, inane, and Bruce inwardly braces himself for another five minutes of talking to Olsen as clearly and gently as Batman is capable of, until Olsen can get himself together—except then Olsen blinks once, twice, shakes himself and draws in a ragged breath. "He—no, not yet. But he told me he had something for me, that's why we were supposed to—it was for my camera."

Bruce drops into a crouch and runs a hand lightly over the lines of the downed man's jacket; and yes, there it is, the minor incongruity of an object in a pocket. Inside chest pocket, to be specific. Bruce slides it out and palms it without looking at it, and then glances up at Olsen.

Who's still looking apprehensive, eyes round and hands absently clutching at his chest—leftover surprise from Bruce's landing. But at least he doesn't seem likely to run screaming. "Seriously, though," Olsen says after a second. "Who are you? What are you doing here? How did you know—"

"He wasn't CIA," Bruce repeats, "and you need to be more careful. If anyone else comes up to you talking the way he did—"

"I tell him some weirdo in black is about to land on his head any day now?" Olsen suggests dazedly.

"—don't panic," Bruce says. "Take what he gives you, listen to what he says, and then tell Lois Lane about it."

"Lois—" Olsen cuts himself off, flicks an obvious glance along the line of Bruce's cape trailing out behind him, and swallows. "Are you—is this a Superman thing?"

Across the communicator line, Alfred snorts; Bruce grits his teeth, and then carefully and deliberately forces his jaw to relax. "Something like that," he makes himself say, and then he leaps for the fire escape overhead in a burst, swarms up the outer railing with a rustle, and leaves Olsen gaping and squinting behind him.

He keeps moving for a few blocks, quick and silent, and then finally comes to a stop at the edge of a rooftop, holds the object up and tilts the surface into the dim pale moonlight.

A chip. A tracker, possibly, or data storage—or perhaps the whole surface is simply a mask, something that gives the appearance of technical function, slapped on a chunk of material that will register to whatever scanner Luthor is intending to provide to whichever other pawn is involved in this particular move across the chessboard. Impossible to say without examining it more thoroughly.

It's possible, of course, that this has nothing to do with Luthor. Coincidences do happen. This wouldn't be the first time that while following up on what will turn out to be a dead end in one case, Bruce has stumbled across a clue to another. Possible; but not particularly plausible. There are all sorts of parties who might have an interest in interfering in Nairomi—but with Lane's trip specifically, and in such a convoluted way, jerking Olsen around—

No. Luthor is by far the most likely. And Bruce had thought it himself: Nairomi was one opportunity among several, yes, but the combination of location and bait in Lane overseas was hard to beat. Luthor appears to appreciate as much, given the effort he's put into stringing Olsen along instead of just giving up when the rest of Lane's arrangements proved tamper-proof.

Bruce would almost admire his dedication, if he weren't being so ludicrously inefficient about it.

But Luthor's clearly got some sort of grandiose plan in motion, some cluttered and overengineered plot not to manage the threat Superman represents, nor to simply eliminate him, but to—to toy with him somehow. Because there must be multiple stages to it; Wally Keefe's not going to Nairomi. There must be a bigger picture, ever more moving parts, Luthor's flair for Byzantine melodrama let off the chain.

(Bruce isn't like that. Bruce is—Bruce is ruled by logic, precision, necessity. Bruce is looking for the simplest and most direct solution to an unignorable problem.

He knows what he's doing, he knows where the line is. He's nothing like Luthor at all.)

Which presumably means Luthor's not going to give up. Once he learns what happened with Olsen, he's just going to start looking for another way to get it done.

And Bruce is going to have to be twice as thorough about making sure that whatever it is Luthor's got in mind, it comes to nothing.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

"Look, I'm just saying, that clause weakens the whole line." Lois leans in over Clark's shoulder to stab an accusing finger at his monitor. "It detracts from your point to tack that kind of mealy-mouthed—"

" _Mealy_ -mouthed?"

"— _yes_ , mealy-mouthed—it's not a clarification, it's not an elaboration, it's just hedging," Lois says. "You don't have to pretend to be unsure about this, Clark. You did the legwork, you know the facts. You don't have to be polite about it or apologize for it."

"But—" Clark isn't even sure what he wants to say, how he's going to argue, so maybe it's for the best that that's the moment Jimmy Olsen comes hustling up to the desk.

"Lois! Lois—"

"Hi, Jimmy," Lois says.

"Hey, Jimmy," Clark echoes.

"Sure, yes, hello," Jimmy says, with a weird sickly smile. And then he darts a glance to either side, reaches across the desk for Lois's elbow, and whispers, "I really need to talk to you."

Clark glances at Lois, thinking maybe he's just out of the loop—but no, Lois is frowning, too, so she doesn't know what Jimmy means by that either. "To me? Jimmy—"

" _Yes_ ," Jimmy insists. "That's what he said. Or, well, it's not exactly what he said but I'm going to do it anyway, because I really have no idea what the hell is going on."

"Well, neither do I, right now," Lois says pointedly, raising an eyebrow at him. "He who?"

"The whackjob dressed in black who incapacitated a guy in front of me last night in about five seconds," Jimmy says.

Clark jerks in his chair; and over his shoulder Lois draws in a sharp breath and then says, "Oh," and then, more dryly, "You too, huh?"

"So you _do_ know him!" Jimmy hisses. "Jesus! What is it with you and these caped crusaders? Is this one an alien, too?"

"Not as far as I know," Lois says. "What happened?"

Jimmy seems to be skirting around a lot of the details, or at least as best Clark can tell, he is; Clark isn't quite catching it all, over the white-noise roar in his ears. All at once he clocks the tell-tale reddish sheen to his vision, squeezes his eyes shut and counts backwards from ten a couple times. It doesn't really help.

And then Lois sets a hand on his shoulder, and says to Jimmy, "Okay, but what were you doing there?"

"I was—I was supposed to meet someone," Jimmy mutters, and Clark glances up and can't help but notice the way he's avoiding Lois's eyes. "I thought I was doing the right thing, Lois. I didn't know, okay? The guy, he—I don't think he was who he said he was. I don't know why he would've been setting me up, but your friend said that if it happened again I should tell you about it. That it had something to do with Superman."

It's about sixteen different things Clark never ever wanted to hear, all piled up on top of each other: that someone really is after him somehow, tracking him down or prying for information; that Lois might be in trouble because of it, and now Jimmy, too; that Batman still hasn't goddamn well gotten the message—

"Okay," Lois is saying, "I'm taking you out to dinner and you're telling me everything. Deal?"

"You got it," Jimmy says, mostly sounding relieved, and Clark watches distantly as he hurries away to his own desk.

Lois doesn't move; she's still leaning in, gentle weight of her hand on Clark's shoulder, steady and warm. "Clark," she says carefully. "Hey—Clark," and after a second Clark manages to turn his head and look at her.

And she is, of course, looking back, with a level even gaze. She doesn't look angry; she doesn't even look upset. She should be, Clark thinks. Clark's the reason this is happening, the reason she's involved—she'd never have come to Batman's attention in the first place if it hadn't been for him.

"Whatever you're thinking, cut it out," Lois says. "I got myself into this the second I decided to track you down instead of leaving well enough alone, and I'm not sorry. Okay? We'll figure this out, Smallville." And then, leaning in a little further, one eyebrow raised wryly—"I'm an investigative reporter, you know," she murmurs, smiling, and brushes a quiet kiss against his cheek before she squeezes his shoulder and moves away again. "Seriously, drop that clause, it's not doing you any favors," she adds, more loudly, as she rounds the corner of his desk and strides away.

 

 

 

Clark knows it's not a good idea. Lois is probably right; she's going to be able to untangle this—whatever this is, sooner or later. That Batman's running some kind of investigation of his own shouldn't be a surprise at all, considering his total unwillingness to agree to get his nose out of Clark's business. Clark should be calm about it. Clark should be reasonable.

But he sits there all day at his desk, mindlessly prodding the same six inches of copy, and it just—he just can't let it go.

He's been trying to keep his head on straight. After last time, looking and not looking and not finding anything, he'd decided leaving it alone would be the better part of valor—and waste a lot less of his time. He doesn't let himself listen too hard to anything across the bay, and he spends a lot of time telling himself that he's not going to be the one to make this thing with Batman escalate. There's no need. The cameras are gone, Lois is okay; Superman doesn't yell at people just for the sake of yelling at them, just because he wants to, just because

(—just because there are no answers anywhere else, just because everything Jor-El tells him only confuses him more—because no matter how many disasters he wades into, no matter how many people he saves, he can't help Wally Keefe; because tracking down Batman and screaming at him feels like the one goddamn thing he _can_ do—)

some childish grudging part of him thinks it'll make him feel better.

But it would be justifiable now. Wouldn't it? To just—see whether he can find Batman again, issue another mild and totally warranted warning. Batman needs to know that Superman's still paying attention, that he hasn't gotten away with anything. That he can't keep making a nuisance of himself to people under Superman's protection without Superman intervening.

That's all.

And if Clark's hands are clenching into fists just anticipating it—if Batman reacts badly, if Clark does have to

(—not kill him, never that; Clark's never killing anyone again if he can help it, not ever. But just to—to lay hands on him, to pin him down, to make him understand that he can't keep doing this. To make just one person _listen_ , to even for a moment be in control of something instead of scrambling desperately to keep up—)

act decisively, well, Clark will be ready for it.

 

 

 

It's a relief to get out of the Planet office at last, to shed Clark Kent's plaid and flannel and unassuming smile and be stripped down to skin and uniform. For once, Superman's face feels like—like _letting_ himself be stern, unbending, instead of making himself; because that's how he's felt, how he's wanted to be all day, but Clark Kent can't get away with that.

The night air feels good against his cheeks, the hot skin around his eyes—and it's been a strain, making sure the black crawling lines that come before the laser vision stay off Clark Kent's face. But now it's all right. Clark can let his field of vision turn dull and red, can let the anger well up to the surface at last. Not that he's going to blast anything, not that he even wants to. It's just satisfying, in a grim petty way, to know that he could; to know that anyone who looks at him right now will know it, too.

He just flies, for a little while. He's not even really paying attention to where he's going. It's not that he tries to end up over Gotham. But he does, and when there's a flutter of cloth, the low soft scratch of white noise—an open radio channel?—from much higher up than anything else, well. It's only reasonable to go see what it is.

And, sure enough, there's a figure crouched at one corner of the Gotham clocktower, looming above most of the rest of the city skyline—and blacker than the night sky behind him, a silhouette even in the dark.

Clark feels his face settle into cold sharp lines, and allows himself to slow a little, lets the rush of air and the rustle of his cape reach Batman first. Just to see the way the set of Batman's shoulders tightens, how the angle of his jaw knots up.

(It wouldn't be visible to anyone else. Wouldn't even be visible to Clark, if—

—if he hadn't already been letting his gaze flick along the line of Batman's throat—)

"I told you to let this go."

"And I told you I didn't answer to you," Batman says, in that deep flat growl.

Clark clenches his fists a little tighter, and makes himself draw in a breath, let it out slow. "Don't approach Lois Lane again. Do you understand? She has nothing to do with this—"

"If you think that's true, you haven't been paying attention."

Clark grits his teeth, and he can feel his eyes, his eyelids, flare with heat. As if he could honestly be so clueless that he doesn't know Lois is in danger because of him—as if it doesn't weigh on him, as if there's anything he wouldn't do to change that—

"If you come after her again, I won't let it slide. You target one more person looking for information about me and the Bat is done. Do you understand?"

It's not a death threat. But Clark knows it sounds like one, knows Batman will probably think it is—and Batman doesn't flinch. He just looks at Clark, steady, expressionless. "I know what's at stake here," he says, as if in agreement. "Do you?"

For an instant, Clark's so furious he can't see past it—literally, his vision a wash of red. He squeezes his eyes shut and lets the crackling blaze fill him up, the hot white of the laser vision at its core; the desperation and rage and helplessness that's been dogging him for a year, for his whole life, all caught alight at once.

And then, behind his eyelids, it goes dark. He burns out. He can hear his own breath coming fast, the ragged edge to it; the chill of the night air against his skin, the murmur of Gotham below him.

He opens his eyes again, and it's—it's just him and Batman staring at each other across a span of cool empty air, capes snapping.

"Leave me alone," Clark says quietly. "Please, just—just leave me alone."

Batman is silent. Clark can see the whites of his eyes, the flicker of his gaze dropping away and then returning to Clark; the ripple of his jaw working, but his throat doesn't move, his mouth doesn't part. He's still not _answering_ —

Clark crosses the space between them in an instant, so fast Batman doesn't even have time to react, reflexively or otherwise, before Clark's caught him by the chin, thumb at his jaw and fingers digging into the side of his throat, pinning him against the side of the clocktower. Not enough to choke, not even enough to bruise—he just wants, with grim ugly intensity, for Batman to understand that he _could_ ; to demonstrate exactly how much restraint he's always, always exercising—

Batman doesn't move, doesn't flinch. Clark's grip, the way Clark's pushed him back against the clocktower, has tipped his head up and back a little, but his eyes are still fixed steadily on Clark.

Clark can feel his pulse, the twitch of muscle in his jaw, the scrape of—of stubble, ten o'clock shadow by now, against Clark's fingertips.

(Strange, to think of whoever it is who's inside this suit, taking it off and going to sleep; waking up; shaving.)

"Leave me alone," Clark says again, but it comes out all wrong: too uneven, too soft. Like he's asking instead of telling, and for something else entirely.

And he finds he doesn't want to hear the answer. He feels his grip ease, one strange stretched-out moment where he isn't holding Batman down anymore but—but just—touching—

He hurls himself backwards, plunges fifteen stories so fast he can hear a muted boom, feel the brief chill of a vapor cone against his hands; and then he's away, crossing the flat dark water of the bay, and he doesn't look back.

 

 

 

There's a statue going up in Heroes Park.

Clark knows about it, obviously. It's been hard to miss it, that close to the ship. But nobody asked Superman to show up for the final unveiling, and Clark can't help but be relieved about it.

He's almost forgotten it's coming, by the time it does. Batman wiped the whole thing out of his head. But he can hear it when people start arriving to set up a podium, speakers, barriers, and he can hear it when a crowd begins to gather.

"You're monitoring, right?" he asks the ship.

"Yes," the ship agrees.

Just in case. Clark's not expecting anything bad to happen, exactly—but since Black Zero, since he decided to be Superman and do it right, his awareness of precisely how many things can go wrong in a public space filled with people has expanded dramatically. Terrible things happen every day, all around the world, and Clark can only stop the ones he knows about.

But the ship's sensors can keep track of a lot more things than Clark can by himself.

And Clark hadn't planned to watch, but all at once he's morbidly curious.

"Show me," he says, and scoots out of the opening in the wall in time to let it close, right before the whole face of it ripples and reconstructs itself: receding away from him into a three-dimensional display, almost a diorama, of the park outside—the crowd, tiny figures jostling and pressing close; the statue rising over them, neatly covered with a huge rippling sheet of material draped across it, presumably ready to drop at the appropriate moment.

Clark stares at it. The shape's obviously obscured; it doesn't look like much of anything right now. But he knows what's underneath, Superman's upraised hand the highest point, reaching out above his downturned face. Nobody asked Clark about the design, but—if there has to be a statue of Superman, at least it's kneeling. And the other hand, outstretched, inviting. That's okay, too.

He just wishes it weren't so big. There's something about the idea of the crowd out there, gathered and waiting, and the statue towering over them, the way they're going to stare and clap, that makes an uncomfortable heat crawl up Clark's cheeks.

"You have scans of the statue?" he says.

The ship doesn't reply aloud. But the model displayed in the wall changes a little, glimmer of metal rearranging itself, to show the outline of the statue beneath the fall of material. The uniform, and the enormous sigil of the House of El.

Clark reaches out, absent, and the wall instantly shifts to accommodate, zooming in neatly until the statue is almost close enough to touch.

Hope.

Clark draws a slow breath and rubs a hand over his face. Except that isn't what it means to Wally Keefe, or to Wayne, or to Batman. Everything he's done since Black Zero hasn't been enough to change that; will it ever be? He doesn't know what else to do except keep trying, but it feels so small next to—next to all this fear and anger, all this suffering, the echoes of Black Zero still reverberating. General Zod, Faora-Ul, the others: he thinks of them and is almost envious. He can't regret having stopped them, knowing what they wanted and what it would have done to the planet; but at least they'd had a purpose, a goal. At least they'd known what the hell they were doing.

He squeezes his eyes shut. "Jor-El," he says, and he can hear the soft shimmering sound of the projection taking shape, even without looking at it. "If you and my—my mother, if you'd used the Codex the way you were intended to, who would I have been?"

"The House of El would not have received permission to generate a new member for at least another cycle," Jor-El says after a moment. "But if it had, Lara and I would have parented that child. The Codex does allow selected parents to contribute superficial features to a genetic profile, as long as none conflict with that profile's parameters." He pauses, and then adds quietly, "They would most likely have belonged to the artisan guild."

"Sounds nice," Clark murmurs.

"The artisan guild was responsible for works of tremendous beauty," Jor-El says, and Clark knows it's only programming, only a calculated extrapolation of the way his biological father's voice might have sounded if he'd ever talked about this; but Jor-El's tone is grave and wistful, and Clark's closed eyes are stinging just listening to it. "Craftsmanship, design, and art on Krypton had advanced to a level I cannot hope to describe for you, Kal—we painted with colors this language has no words for, we wove with thread made of light itself, we forged vast sculptures with our minds alone. The tools we used had been refined to so great a degree, the limitations were not theirs but ours."

"Yours," Clark repeats, leading.

"Our creativity, our imagination," Jor-El says. "Consensus guided the Codex; an analysis of historical databases will show that variation diminished over time. We did not choose to create artists whose art would not conform to a generally accepted set of expectations."

And Clark does understand what he means, remembers enough art history to know that some of the most influential art on Earth was considered ugly or valueless, even disgusting, when it was made. But it sounds wonderfully, sweetly tempting anyway: to be so clearly defined, to walk a path without stones or forks or wrong turns; to _know_ , without doubt or question, what you would do and that you would do it well, that everything you made would be beautiful, would be loved—

"I wish you had," he whispers. "God, I wish you had."

"Kal—"

"I _wish_ you'd made me that way," Clark says, louder, faster, clenching his fists just for the sake of the ache it puts in his knuckles. "I wish there was only one thing I was supposed to be, and everyone knew exactly what it was, and I couldn't get it wrong—"

"Kal," Jor-El says again, very low, but Clark doesn't want to look at him, doesn't want to answer.

And then he doesn't have to: before Jor-El can say anything else, there's a muffled clonking sound. Distant—but closer than the statue, closer than the crowd, and Clark can hear it even if a human couldn't.

"Later," Clark says quickly, a little pleadingly, and risks a glance; Jor-El is watching him with a grave steady look, but then nods silently, and the projection fades away and leaves Clark in the chamber alone.

Just in time for Clark to tune in a little closer and hear another set of clonks, and—is that _knocking_? Clark frowns absently at the wall, which is still dutifully showing him the statue outside. Who would just walk up to the ship and rap on the hull like—

"Hello? You in there?"

Of course, Clark thinks grimly. Who else?

 

 

 

He doesn't exactly use his top speed to switch over to his uniform; he's not eager to spend any more time with Bruce Wayne than he has to. He grudgingly tells the ship to listen to Wayne—he's expecting to hear Wayne come in, and he'd rather haul the man off to a safe distance himself than get any authorities involved, even though Wayne's obviously crossed the security perimeter.

But instead, when he tunes in, all he hears is the sound of Wayne's shoes, still outside. Still outside, but—ascending? What the hell is Wayne doing?

Clark grits his teeth and drifts up to the ceiling instead. The ship courteously melts away in front of him, and when he comes up through the hull, Wayne is there. There, and just stepping off the last of a set of stairs that wasn't there before—and they're dissolving back into the hull behind Wayne, three and then two and then one, and then with a satisfied little ripple everything has smoothed into place again.

"There you are! I hope I'm not interrupting anything," Wayne says, with a wide false smile that says exactly the opposite. "If you left some little old lady to cross the road alone just because of me—"

"What do you want, Mr. Wayne?" Clark keeps his tone brisk, businesslike.

But of course Wayne doesn't take the hint. "Oh, you know," he says, with a careless wave of his hand. "Just keeping an eye on things. No true Superman fan would miss this, am I right?"

Clark doesn't follow the line of his gesture toward the crowd below them, doesn't look away; with Wayne's smug stare on him, it feels even weirder and more embarrassing for all those people to be here just to look at a statue of him, and Clark doesn't really want to think about it. "Oh, is that what you'd call yourself, Mr. Wayne?" he says instead, raising an eyebrow.

Wayne grins and shrugs. "Well, I might be warming to the idea," he suggests. "Real nice view from up here," and Clark's about to point out that he isn't even looking in the right direction to appreciate the view when he realizes Wayne's gaze is deliberately tracing the lines of Clark's chest instead—

Jesus, doesn't he have any shame at all? He doesn't even _like_ Clark. "Excuse me?" Clark says, chilly.

"You heard me," Wayne says brightly, and then he _winks_. "I'll say one thing for you, Superman: not everyone could pull off a suit that form-fitting. And not everyone who could has the generosity to try."

Clark stares at him; he doesn't waver. "I'll—choose to take that as the compliment it could have been, Mr. Wayne," Clark says at last, and for an instant Wayne's smile flashes brighter, wider, almost warm.

And then he looks away, out across the park, and nods toward the distant bulk of the statue. "Don't suppose they had you model."

"No," Clark says, flat.

"Too bad. And I imagine they went with the uniform? Shame. I'm sure you could pull off a toga."

"Mr. Wayne—"

"Tell me, is the 'S' for 'Superman'? Did you already have the name picked out?"

"It's not an 'S'," Clark tells him patiently, and it's almost funny: the memory of being shut in that little room with Lois, telling her the same thing, is kind of a comfort. At the time, he wouldn't have guessed there'd be anything about that day that he'd look back on particularly fondly. "It's my family's symbol, the name of their house."

Wayne looks at him silently for a moment. "Your biological family," he says at last.

"Yes. It was on the pod I came here in, but I—I didn't know what it meant for a long time. They sent some information with me, but I couldn't access it until I found this ship."

Wayne doesn't say anything. His eyes are narrowing, his gaze abruptly sharp, assessing, and Clark has no idea why—he stares blankly back at Wayne, until Wayne finally barks out a laugh. "So you didn't know anything. You expect me to believe that? You just—landed here, without a clue, no idea where you'd come from or why, until you _happened_ to trip over this ship—"

"It's the truth," Clark says, bewildered. "You—why would I lie about that? It's the truth. I was a baby, I—how could I have known? I told you: Earth's the only home I've ever had, Mr. Wayne." He shakes his head, rubs at his mouth; and he's doing this all wrong, not looking the way Superman should, but he—he's tired of it all. He's so tired. "General Zod invited me up onto his ship. Did you know that? He took me up there and he told me what he was going to do, and he wanted me to help him.

"Can you imagine that? He thought I'd be tempted. He thought I'd want to sit up there and wipe the world clean, remake it. I'd have laughed in his face, if I hadn't been so angry. All I've ever wanted to do with the world is live in it—be part of it. All I ever wanted, growing up, was—" He shrugs, helpless, grappling for a way to say it, to sum up years and years of trying and failing to belong. "—was to be human."

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

"You are," Bruce hears himself say, much too gently. Because it's the obvious response; because it's what the alien clearly wants to hear. Because it's not safe to interact with him as Batman and it needs to stay safe to interact with him as Bruce Wayne. Or maybe because the alien has made him, with such subtlety he didn't even feel it happen—

But no: the alien is gazing at him so _gratefully_ , bright warm eyes, soft mouth

(not that Bruce is looking)

and if he'd put the words on Bruce's tongue himself, surely he couldn't manage to look so _glad_ to hear them said.

"Or at least you're doing a splendid impression of one at the moment," Bruce adds, lighter, glancing away. "It's a time-honored human tradition, you know, sitting around feeling sorry for yourself, having an existential crisis or two, that sort of thing."

He chooses his tone carefully, includes a snide edge that would get anyone's back up. But it isn't quite enough to send them back to familiar ground. When he glances over again, Superman is still watching him steadily; there's something gentle, open, searching, in that perfect face. No irritation, no frustration, not even that closed-up icy politeness. "Thank you," the alien says quietly, and he's not saying it in response to Bruce Wayne's casual mockery.

Bruce looks away, out across the park, just in time to see the statue freed at last—cloth pooling at its feet, a wave of cheering and applause rippling out through the crowd. The most he'd been able to muster beforehand was a grim appreciation of the irony: as if Superman didn't already loom large enough over them all, as if he weren't already far enough out of their reach. Except now Bruce is standing within arm's length of the alien—closer, even—and all he can think is that that expressionless stone face looks nothing like Superman.

(Even at the gala, he hadn't looked like that; Bruce hadn't hated him for his featurelessness but for the vague patronizing warmth of him. And outside, he'd looked stern, grave, icily displeased—and then dismayed, at Wally Keefe, dismayed and even sorrowful. With Batman, he's been distant, frustrated, and then angry—

Angry, last night, compellingly and terribly; his grip on Bruce's face, all the hot intensity of him pressing Bruce back against the cold stone of the clocktower, the impossible strength in those hands. He could have done anything, _anything_ —and yet Bruce had looked, later, and had found only the barest bruise, the blue shadow of a single fingertip just beneath the line of his jaw.

It would have been inexplicably and hopelessly foolish, to in some twisted way be disappointed; and Bruce refuses, _refuses_ , to allow himself to be foolish about this—)

"For what?" Bruce says aloud. "Yes, I'm sure you're just as self-involved, judgmental, and irrational as any of us. Congratulations."

But it's still not enough; the alien just smiles at him. "I'm sure I am," he agrees. "And I hadn't thought about it that way, Mr. Wayne—that there are other ways to be human besides biology. So: thank you."

Not precisely what Bruce had said, and certainly not what he meant. He'd allowed himself the luxury of subjective interpretations of the alien's expressions and body language simply because it was data—because the alien had to be expecting as much, and whether it was sincere or insincere, genuine or counterfeit, it could still at least tell Bruce how the alien intended himself to be perceived. To assume Superman feels emotion at all is to make an unsubstantiated leap that ignores the potential complexities of non-human brain chemistry and function, to assume a fundamental similarity where none may exist—

But then Bruce can hardly prove the negative, either. And if anything Superman has demonstrated too many fundamental similarities to humans for Bruce's taste, rather than too few. A staggeringly improbable number of them, in fact.

So perhaps Bruce is only being accurate, when he finds himself thinking the alien's looking at him almost fondly.

"I look forward to proving myself to your satisfaction one day," the alien adds, after a moment. "But if it won't be today—pardon the pun, but do you need a lift?"

He gestures toward—the statue, Bruce thinks at first, except it's more like the podium in front of it. The podium where concluding remarks already appear to have been made, and music is starting to play for a crowd that's beginning to disperse.

No apparent move by Luthor, then. Which only makes it more important to continue monitoring the diplomatic summit and the Nairomi situation, of course.

And, more to the point, makes it time for Bruce to get out of here—which is where the alien's invitation comes in.

Superman looks a little more like his statue self, now, a hand politely extended toward Bruce; but the statue isn't raising an eyebrow, can't achieve the same warm, steady blue gaze.

"Oh, don't worry about me," Bruce says easily. "I've got my own ride back to Gotham, and you have more important things to do. There must be a kitten up a tree somewhere around here, after all."

It's the right thing to say, and he strikes the right tone in saying it: flippant, dismissive, impolite. Superman doesn't press the matter; he inclines his head in acknowledgment and then promptly asks the ship to please accommodate Bruce.

(It doesn't seem to occur to him that Bruce could take advantage, that he's failed to place a limit on the ship's cooperation with Bruce's requests. But then he's standing right there—what could Bruce possibly do in front of him, quickly enough to prevent him from countermanding it?)

And before the first stair-step has even finishing forming out of the hull, Superman is already rising into the air.

"That's a hell of a bookend to put on a conversation," Bruce calls up to him.

And Superman—laughs. "I'll see you around, Mr. Wayne," he says, and then he takes off, up, straight into the sunlight, and is gone.

It was the right thing to say. Bruce Wayne has no reason to accept, and Bruce has ten thousand reasons to refuse.

(But for all the legitimate justifications he can bring to bear—that Superman might be gathering intelligence of his own on Bruce Wayne, might be looking for an excuse to be invited into his offices, or could even simply intend to fly Bruce out over the bay and drop him—the most frightening outcome of all would be nothing of the kind.

The most frightening outcome of all would be none of the above: would be the alien carrying Bruce safely the whole way, held carefully against that chest, arms around those shoulders; would be Bruce trusting him, even if only for ten minutes, and being given no reason to regret it.

The subconscious is so irrational—that might very well be enough to deal Bruce's objectivity a blow from which it could never recover.)

 

 

 

Olsen is a clear priority. Bruce won't lose focus, won't let the diplomatic summit slip from view; but he interfered directly with Olsen, which makes this an excellent opportunity to assess Luthor's level of investment. A cautious opponent might spook, might adjust their tack in response to the evidence that someone is paying attention. But Bruce casts his mind back over his admittedly limited experience with Luthor in matters of business, and he can't say "cautious" is a word he would apply. And if Luthor does escalate instead—

Olsen hadn't done anything wrong, except perhaps be a bit too credulous, a bit too eager to make himself useful. Bruce is the one who interfered—who used an opportunity Olsen provided him to make a statement. And if Luthor decides to make a statement in return, Bruce isn't going to allow Olsen to end up as punctuation.

But Bruce can admit it presents a somewhat different picture than Alfred is used to seeing, to have only a single monitor in the corner looping video of the alien.

"Dare I ask, sir?"

"Nothing's changed," Bruce says flatly.

"Hasn't it?"

Bruce refuses to look up. No point, when he knows what he'll see: Alfred, looking sage and superior, one eyebrow raised. Or perhaps both, if he's particularly intent on making his point. "Superman remains the highest priority. Whatever Luthor is planning, it revolves around him; Luthor's already demonstrated an interest in Olsen." Bruce flicks a glance up at one screen, which marks Olsen's current position—still in the office. Good.

"Therefore, we monitor Olsen," Alfred concludes. "Naturally. And if anyone were tempted to imagine that we were, in doing so, rendering even the most indirect of assistance to Superman, they would be—"

"Shortsighted in their analysis," Bruce says, clipped. "If Luthor's up to something, we need to know what it is. That's all."

"Ah, yes, that most well-worn of truisms: the enemy of my enemy is still my enemy, because after all one can never have enough."

It might have angered Bruce to be prodded at so indelicately, except Alfred's tone is light, droll; Bruce finds himself snorting half a laugh through his nose instead. "I couldn't have said it better myself," he murmurs, and glances up in time to catch the flat look Alfred shoots him—and the small fond twitch at the corner of Alfred's mouth.

"Well, I do hate to disappoint, Master Wayne, but before you head out I had wanted to tell you: you remember our—visitor?"

"Testing our security."

"Yes. I was able to make contact, and I'm afraid I was correct. She intended no harm."

"She," Bruce repeats.

"Indeed. In point of fact, once we had introduced ourselves, she proved—" Alfred pauses delicately, and clears his throat. "Quite congenial."

"I suppose next you'll be inviting her over for tea."

Alfred adopts a considering expression. "The thought had crossed my mind, sir. In point of fact, she's offered us some information that may be of use; extending a little hospitality in return would only be polite."

Bruce raises an eyebrow. "And how does she know what may be of use?"

"We've discussed some interests we have in common," Alfred says, with a casual shrug. "Specifically, it appears our friend has a bone to pick with Mr. Luthor."

"Our _friend_ certainly is well-informed," Bruce says, a little more sharply than he means to.

Alfred looks at him silently for a moment. "I wouldn't compromise operational security lightly," he says, "but I had no choice, sir. She demonstrated an understanding of the importance of a well-brewed English breakfast tea. What was I to do?"

And he's still teasing, but Bruce finds himself pausing anyway, allowing his expression to settle into sobriety. "I do trust your judgment. You know that."

"Yes, Master Wayne," Alfred agrees, very low, and the fondness is spilling out across his whole face, now, the lines of his mouth and brow, his eyes. "I know that."

Bruce looks away. "Well. Good. You should—stay in touch with your friend, then. See what else she has to say about Luthor."

"Certainly. I'll be on comms within the hour, if there should be a need. And you had better go," Alfred adds, merciful, "if you're planning to keep an eye on Olsen tonight."

"Yes," Bruce says, and stands.

 

 

 

Olsen doesn't leave the office alone, and not even because of Bruce: Lane is with him. Bruce ignores the inexplicable lurch in his gut

(— _if I scream, Superman will be here inside thirty seconds_ ; and will she, if the Bat should drop down in front of her a second time? He hadn't expected to see Superman tonight, hadn't anticipated the possibility—if some sequence of events should play out in which he is forced to intervene, he'll do it with the inescapable awareness that the alien might appear at any moment, might shove him into a wall again for his trouble, might—might touch him—)

and stays as close as he can get without making himself obvious. Lane and Olsen are both already targets Luthor's interested in on their own, never mind together.

But when something does happen, it looks almost like coincidence.

There's nothing blatantly unusual about the man who hustles up behind them as they walk, as if he means to pass them; there's nothing out of the ordinary about the gun he jams in under Olsen's elbow, or the alley he quietly insists they turn into. The way his gaze catches on Lane's earrings, necklace, watch, and Olsen's pockets—it really does give every appearance of a mugging.

Except, Bruce thinks, it's Lane and Olsen, and Bruce isn't comfortable attributing anything that happens around the two of them to chance, at this point.

He really is making a spectacle of himself—but it can't be helped. He drops out of the shadows overhead, watches not fear, not even recognition, but something that's almost relief sweep across Lane's and Olsen's faces, and feels the corner of his mouth twist. That's the last reaction he's ever wanted anyone having to the Bat. He's going to have to take steps to make them understand what they're really looking at, after this is over.

But first: the mugger. If that's what he is. He's wheeling around even as Bruce sweeps toward him; he looses one shot, two, three, as Bruce closes with him, and Bruce feels the satisfying jolts of impact. Bullets penetrate the outer armor weave but not the liquid underlayer—no ricochets, though Lane and Olsen can't know it and both have the sense to duck down anyway. A sufficiently sharp blow to the forearm knocks the gun from his hand, and Bruce traps it against the pavement with one boot when it lands and with a shove sends it skidding out of reach, and then—

It's not that he doesn't see the blade. He approves, in the abstract, of the man's preparedness; wise of him to bring a secondary weapon. But it shouldn't matter any more than the gun did. Bruce blocks, strikes, blocks again, another three blows already planned out that should allow him to remove the knife from the man's grip without harming the man unduly, and he's well aware that the man is about to stab toward his midsection. That maneuver was predictable; it's included in Bruce's assessment, and it is, if anything, satisfying to see that he guessed the man's likeliest next move with accuracy.

And then it goes in.

The sensation is blocked off, quarantined—Bruce shuts away the screaming of his nerves, the sudden wrenching agony of a sharp edge where no sharp edge should be in a body that's still actively moving, and focuses on what matters: his job has been made easier. A twist of his torso and a blow to the arm, and the knife is out of the man's possession three moves earlier than it would have been otherwise. He stabbed it too deeply into Bruce to recover it.

Efficiency is now paramount. Bruce's ability to maintain this level of activity is no longer certain. A sufficiently powerful blow to the solar plexus, and the man is down—not unconscious, but dazed and unarmed. He shouldn't present a serious threat to Lane and Olsen. And—

Bruce blinks, swallows, and takes a carefully measured step back, reaching with one hand for the hilt of the knife, observing with distant interest its exact position along his side. Below the ribs, not through them; but judging by the amount of blood currently flowing across Bruce's glove, it may well have penetrated the liver.

"Jesus Christ," Olsen is saying, "Jesus Christ—"

"911, Jimmy," Lane snaps.

"Get out of here," Bruce says, but Lane's not listening; she's coming closer, stepping over the groaning man on the ground and reaching toward him.

"You get yourself a suit of custom-made body armor, and you can't be bothered to make sure it won't stop a knife?" she's muttering.

"Not a normal knife," Bruce grits out, and jerks away from Lane—but the blood has already made it down his hip, his leg, the side of his boot, pooling black under the faint streetlight. Impossible to miss.

"Well, that's not good," Lane says after a moment. "I'm guessing you know better than to pull that out."

Bruce doesn't dignify this with a reply. He does know better; but it's difficult. The blade is impossibly present—every breath, every movement, the slightest tension in his muscles, only serves as a bright-hot jolting reminder that it's—it's _in_ him, it's in him and it shouldn't be and he wants nothing more than to yank it out—

"And you aren't going to be cooperative about an ambulance, either," Lane says.

Bruce is unforgivably slow to catch up, to understand where she's going; he's distracted, reaching unthinkingly for his ear. But Alfred won't be there. _Within the hour_ —it hasn't been long enough yet. If Alfred were on comms, he'd have announced himself. It must not have been long enough.

By the time he does realize what Lane means, and manages to say, "Don't," she's already made up her mind, mouth flat and face stern.

"Sorry, but you aren't calling the shots right now," she says, and then she tips her head back and addresses the sky. "Superman—it's important."

And she hadn't been exaggerating. She hardly even raises her voice, and thirty seconds is still an overestimate: within five, Bruce hears a distant boom, and within fifteen Superman's touching down at the far end of the alley, with one last swirl of that brilliant red cape before it settles around him. "What happened?" he snaps, striding forward, and Bruce ruthlessly controls the urge to leap for a window ledge, because—

Because it won't help. His legs aren't listening to him anymore. He'd been standing on his own, he's sure of it; and yet that cool steady surface against his shoulders is a wall, now. Even as he realizes it, he's wavering further still, forced to flatten a hand against the bricks, and the wet smack of his bloody glove is more than audible to him, let alone to the alien.

"We were attacked."

The alien rounds on Bruce with a thunderous scowl. "You—"

"Not _him_ ," Lane says impatiently. "Him!"

"But—"

"He saved us," Olsen volunteers, from the other side of Lane. "Which I guess means he was following us, and that's kind of creepy, but still. We didn't get shot in the head, which we might have if he hadn't been here—"

"I'd have come for you," Superman insists. "He didn't have to—"

"—and now he's bleeding out," Olsen concludes, and Superman stops short.

Bruce's eyes have fallen shut without permission; but he can hear the alien breathing—why does he bother? Habit? He can hear the alien breathing. And then a footstep, two, and a hand

(careful, gentle—but it _must_ be a lie)

against his ribs, and Bruce tries to wrench himself away, retreat to a safe distance, except the wall is right there; there's nowhere to go.

(And what is safe distance, from Superman?)

Sirens, far away but coming closer. Bruce needs to get out of here before emergency services arrive.

"It's none of your concern," Bruce growls, but the alien isn't listening. He's looking down at his hand against Bruce's armor—at the dark blood already seeping between his fingers, across his knuckles. "Leave me alone—"

He realizes what he's done the moment the words leave his mouth; and Superman recognizes them, too, a flicker crossing that perfect face. "No," Superman says quietly, a deliberate echo. "No, I can't do that. You're bleeding too much—you must realize that."

"And you're going to help me," Bruce rasps, flat.

Superman frowns at him thoughtfully, glancing at Lane; and then all at once something seems to occur to him, his expression clearing, his chin coming up. "I'm going to do my best," he says. "I know what you think of me, and you know what I think of you. But I'm not going to let you die."

Bruce grits his teeth, firms his jaw. It doesn't matter that he's dizzy, nauseated, that his face and his fingers are both going cold. It can't matter, because allowing Superman to interact with him at his most vulnerable is _not_ an option—

—except Superman already has an arm around his back, is already holding him in a firm steady grip he can't break. There is no ground under Bruce's feet, no wall at his back; a dizzying swirl of lights, and then it's just darkness, darkness and the rush of air and Superman's goddamn hands—the strongest thing in the universe, a power that could tear a planet apart, bent to the task of holding Bruce together instead.

A change in the movement of the air, the speed. Light again, and this time glinting off metal. The ship—the interior? Superman is still moving so quickly, corridors flashing past; and then all at once the world comes to a halt around them. The alien is—is carrying Bruce, easing him down against a gently slanting surface. Talking to someone, though Bruce can't tell who, can't parse the words; his vision is fading out at the edges, everything smeared and blurring.

Abrupt sharp brightness: pain. The knife—the alien pulled it out. He could have done that in the alley, if he wanted Bruce to die. Why drag Bruce here just to—?

For a instant, Bruce is certain the warm wetness crawling up his hands, his arms, his chest, is his own blood—that the alien is going to stand there and watch him drown in it. But the alien still has hold of him, is pulling him deeper into—a pool? Not water; the fluid is strange, viscous, lapping at Bruce's armor with something he might almost call eagerness—

A hand on his face. Superman, leaning close. The alien looks concerned, even frantic, and yet Bruce finds his bleary attention entirely caught by the single stray curl across the forehead, the incredible intensity of those eyes.

"—whatever you have to! Just _fix him_ ," someone is shouting. "Come on, _please_ —"

Light, overflowing, so bright Bruce can't see past it, and then he's gone.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

The genesis chamber hadn't exactly been Clark's biggest priority, when he started helping the ship repair itself. He remembers how it looked when Jor-El first showed it to him, the suspended pods of liquid arrayed around those graceful columns—and he'd come down to see it once after the crash, bits of wreckage tossed around and a murky pool forming. The ship had assured him that it wouldn't be dangerous to leave it that way: the equipment could be recreated, and wasn't strictly necessary in an emergency situation anyway. The same way the walls changed under Clark's hands to make control contacts, the floor could change underneath the fluid and create a bay capable of essentially the same functions.

And he hadn't made it go into detail about what those functions were, at the time, but—surely if it could make a whole new person in there, it could repair one, too. Right? Humans are a lot like Kryptonians, as far as Clark can tell, and the ship has to have plenty of data on them by now, with all those researchers constantly under its internal sensors. Humans are probably simpler, even, without all the weird light absorption and conversion, all the quirks and powers.

But he still isn't quite sure what's going to happen, when the light filling the pool finally dies away. He's holding on to Batman, one hand fisted in that long black cape, because if he weren't he's afraid Batman would just sink—all that body armor probably isn't very buoyant, and the last thing he wants to do is fix the hole in Batman's side and then promptly drown him in alien goo.

For an instant, though, he almost thinks it didn't work. Batman is so _still_ under Clark's hands. And that's—he's never been like that. Even at his least cooperative, crouched in the dark like a statue, there had always been something alive about him: all that silent coiled strength, the singing tension in the jaw or shoulders. The sheer anger he's always shown Clark, vibrant and unmistakable.

But he's breathing. Clark can hear it. He's breathing, and he's—Clark can see his closed eyes through the cowl, the flicker of movement beneath the eyelids.

(It's like that night, his fingertips against Batman's jaw, feeling the scrape of stubble: the way it had made him think abruptly of the man underneath the cape, the suit, the way he'd suddenly been aware he was pressing a _person_ back against all that stone.

He's interacted with Batman more times than he'd like, stared at that cowl across dark rooftops and alleyways. He knew there were eyeholes. But he—well. Somehow it had never quite occurred to him that Batman had—eyelashes.)

"Batman," he tries. It seems a little silly, but he doesn't have anything else to call the guy. "Batman. Batman, are you—"

Batman comes awake with a thrash of limbs. He doesn't cry out, doesn't gasp; behind the sudden splash and churn of liquid, he's utterly silent in every way he can control. Clark hangs on just long enough to make sure he really has found his footing, that he isn't going to collapse again, and then lets go—and in a sudden wet rush, spatter of drops flying, Batman's halfway across the pool from him, crouched defensively.

For a long moment, the only sound is the leftover seething of the fluid as it settles. Clark deliberately doesn't listen any closer, doesn't keep trying to catch Batman's breath or heartbeat. He just stands there with his hands extended, palms out, and waits while Batman's gaze flicks around the chamber—down to the liquid, still frothing with leftover glimmers of light around their thighs; up the walls all the way to the opening of the corridor behind Clark; and then, after another few seconds, back to Clark.

"It's all right," Clark says quietly. "I brought you to my ship. Do you remember?"

"Yes."

"You were injured," Clark adds. "I wanted to help. I'm not going to hurt you."

"You aren't," Batman repeats flatly, and Clark can't even tell whether it's meant to be an expression of skepticism or agreement.

"No," Clark says anyway, in case it'll help.

"You'll forgive me if I'm not eager to take your word for it," Batman says, raising one deliberate hand to skim a gloved finger along his throat illustratively, and—oh.

"You're right," Clark says quickly, and backs away one step, another, with an undignified slosh. "About last time—I'm sorry. I shouldn't have come at you like that."

Batman stares at him, silent and utterly unreadable.

"Are you all right? Now, I mean. Did it work?"

A moment's pause. "Yes."

Clark can't help but raise an eyebrow. "And if it hadn't, you'd tell me."

More silence; but this time Clark's pretty sure he knows what it means.

Still, he can't exactly blame Batman for not feeling particularly forthcoming at the moment. "Do you—are you still bleeding?" he tries instead.

"You can't tell," Batman says, flat again. Was that supposed to be a question?

"There's blood all over you," Clark tells him. "Inside and outside the suit. Even if the wound's closed—"

"It is," Batman bites out, and Clark allows himself a little sigh of relief.

Because he'd told the truth: the blood didn't vanish with the wound. He can still hear it seeping, can see the sticky dark smear of it even against the black of Batman's suit—though he can't quite see _through_ the suit, whatever coating Batman used on that glider of his evidently applied to the body armor too. A vague inverted shadow of bones, the sharp outlines of three bullets, is about the best Clark can get; and the bullets are outside Batman's body, not inside, embedded in the outer layer of the armor.

Clark had been pretty sure the ship could help Batman. But there hadn't really been a lot of time to spare, or any way to be sure. The pool could just as easily have made it worse, if Clark had somehow managed to give the wrong instruction; or the ship might not have understood how to finish the job, might have replenished Batman's blood supply without actually closing the wound that was draining it.

But apparently it didn't.

"Well—good," Clark says, fumbling. "That's good. Thank you for helping—" and he almost says _Jimmy_ , unthinking, before he remembers that Superman probably shouldn't sound too familiar with the Planet staff. Especially not when he's talking to Batman, who can't be counted on not to notice a slip like that. "—Mr. Olsen. And Ms. Lane."

Batman's stare grows, if anything, icier. "I didn't do it for you."

"No, I know that. You didn't have to. I'm grateful anyway."

Silence.

Clark carefully restrains the irritated huff he's tempted to let out, and makes himself just watch patiently as Batman stands there, gaze tripping yet again around the pool, up the walls, back past Clark—

To the exit. The exit he'd have to pass Clark to reach.

Clark clears his throat and turns sideways, wading a stride or two closer—not blocking Batman's path anymore, or at least not as much. But the pool, the floor, are still well below the level of the corridor; the crash had sent everything careening down into what had previously been an open descending space nobody was supposed to have to climb into. Or out of. "Ship, can you—make us some stairs, please?"

The ship doesn't reply aloud: a curving set of steps just starts to form itself from the corridor down, aligned neatly against the line of the wall, settling into place with a soft metallic sound.

"Thank you," Clark says to the ship, and then, with a tentative half-smile, to Batman, "I'm guessing you're not interested in being carried again."

Batman doesn't bother to reply. He gives Clark the same flat dark stare as the steps finish forming, with a gentle rush of warmth against Clark's knees as the genesis fluid is displaced by the last few; and then he splashes past Clark, a wide radius carefully maintained, and begins the climb out.

 

 

 

Clark had been ready to get angry again, back in the alley. Thinking Batman had—had cornered Jimmy and Lois, maybe, intending to confront them. And then attacked somebody passing on the street who'd tried to intervene, to boot; yeah, Clark had definitely been ready to get angry.

But it had been impossible to hold onto that spark once Jimmy had explained—once Clark had seen the trail of blood Batman was leaving on the pavement, the hilt of the knife jutting out beneath the sheltering shadow of Batman's cape. And it's not that Clark can't imagine what Batman would get out of saving them: a dead Jimmy and Lois are a Jimmy and Lois who can't tell Batman whatever it is he wants to know, can't serve as bait for Lex Luthor or go walking into traps, or whatever the hell else Batman might have had in mind. But—

But Clark had already been halfway into his uniform when Lois had called for him, because he'd heard those gunshots. He'd known they were happening much too close to Lois for comfort. And he'd seen the bullets caught in Batman's suit. Batman had put himself between Jimmy and Lois and imminent danger, had gotten stabbed for his trouble—and even then he hadn't been willing to give an inch, had still made every effort to tell Superman off and then leave.

Which was so ludicrously stubborn of him that, all at once, it had almost kind of been endearing. 

(Mom's told Clark he's too stubborn for his own good more times than he can count. Maybe introducing her to Batman would take a little of the heat off: give her a basis for comparison that manages to make Clark look totally reasonable.)

And now, well.

Now they're sloshing down the hallway together, still soaked with genesis fluid. Batman's making a particularly distinct sort of squishy wet-sock noise; and Clark listens to it and rubs absently at what's left of Batman's blood on his knuckles, and feels—

He doesn't know what word to use for it. Even Superman can't make the leap it would take to call them _friends_ , right now. But there's something that's not quite tension, in Clark—and when he'd been angry, it had been easy to call it anger; when he'd been afraid, it had been easy to call it fear. But he's not angry or afraid right now, and it's still—it's—something about Batman, about wanting to understand him or to be understood by him, or

(—to learn who he was, what he wanted; to make him see that they didn't have to be enemies, they didn't have to dislike each other; to—

—to touch him again—)

both at the same time. And it's impossible to resent someone who'd take a bullet for Lois, a knife for Jimmy—it's impossible to hate someone whose wet toes are probably pruning up right this very moment inside their intimidating custom black combat boots.

"Nothing's changed."

Clark looks up. He sets a hand absently against the wall, but doesn't ask the ship to open it up into a doorway just yet.

"Hasn't it?" he says, gentle.

And for some reason, that makes Batman's gaze snap to him, sharp. "No," Batman growls, and Clark has to bite down on a smile, because—he's wrong. Even if he still doesn't trust Superman, even if he still considers Clark's motives and actions suspect, even if he's exactly as determined as he ever was to do whatever he intends to do, something's different now: _Clark's_ different now.

Because he's starting to think he and Batman want the same things. Having someone show up out of nowhere, not knowing what they want or what they might do to get it—Clark hadn't reacted any better to it than Batman had. He can't claim to not understand. And—

And they just can't quite seem to leave each other alone.

"Your interference was unnecessary," Batman is saying. "I won't thank you for it."

Clark does smile this time, helpless. "I can't say I was expecting you to."

"My life won't buy you my cooperation."

Jesus, this _guy_. Clark manages to swallow down a laugh; he wouldn't mean it badly, but Batman would probably take it that way. "Oh, I have no doubt your cooperation is priceless," he says instead, with as sincere a Superman face as he can muster.

Batman's glare doesn't diminish in intensity. And it should be annoying, except—

Clark's already spent a year trying to prove to _himself_ that Black Zero doesn't have to be all there is to Superman, that he can do better. If Batman doesn't believe it yet, Clark can't blame him. He can hardly expect Batman to trust him more than he trusts himself.

So Clark doesn't get angry, and he doesn't shove Batman into the wall. He glances up at the ceiling and taps, shave-and-a-haircut, and the ship allows an opening to melt smoothly into being, the cool breeze that's always coming off the park at night sweeping in and catching their capes with a rustle. "Have a good night," he says to Batman, with a nod. And then he can't resist adding, "Try not to get stabbed again."

Batman doesn't answer. He steps out of the ship and is almost immediately lost, one more shadow in the night; but even with the change in lighting between interior and exterior, Clark can follow the line of his movement. Along the side of the ship, crouched low, and then—oh, of course. The glider's shown up, blocking out a patch of stars. A cable is lowered from it, or maybe Batman shoots one up to it. The sound is so brief, so muffled, it's hard for Clark to decide which. And then Batman swarms up into the air, the glider already in motion, and a moment later they've passed over the ship and are gone.

 

 

 

Clark doesn't take off, after. He probably ought to go find Lois and Jimmy, make sure they're really okay; except if he tries, he can hear them from here. They're fine. Lois is walking Jimmy home, listening intently as he tells her all about—oh, right, the first time Batman had shown up in front of him.

Clark can't help but laugh a little, thinking about it. He remembers what Jimmy had said to Lois, _what is it with you and these caped crusaders?_ He hadn't paid it any particular attention at the time, too busy fuming over Batman sticking his nose in where he wasn't wanted—but then it had happened again, later, when he'd been looking for the Bat, everybody he'd run across in Gotham getting one decent glance at his silhouette and making a break for it.

And he'd been frustrated, then, that anybody could confuse him for Batman. But maybe—

Maybe somewhere underneath that, he'd been a little bit afraid. The last time Clark had thought he'd found somebody like him, it had been Zod; it had been Zod and it had been a disaster, and he'd never wanted it to happen again. He hadn't _wanted_ to talk to Batman, to listen to him, if it was just going to end with—with screaming civilians in a train station all over again. And why shouldn't it? What other option was there? Clark hadn't been able to come up with any.

But he should have known better. He'd been thinking like—like Zod, maybe: like there was no way to define people except by which side of a battle they were on; like everything had to be a war.

Except Clark isn't built that way. Even if Zod hadn't had a choice, he does. And he thinks maybe he can see, at last, what the real Jor-El might have been thinking when he'd decided not to use the Codex, to have an unconstructed child. Because Clark doesn't know what he's supposed to be or how he's supposed to do it; and that might scare the hell out of him, but it also means he can change. He can not just do his best, he can redefine it—he can make new decisions, step onto new paths. He doesn't have to keep making the same mistakes, doesn't have to keep looking at things the same way.

Maybe Zod had been designed to think conflict was inevitable, hadn't been able to conceive of a universe without it. But Clark doesn't have to end up that way, and neither does Batman.

Clark had always wanted to be human. He'd said as much, to Bruce Wayne. At the time, Wayne had been generous enough to tell him that he was—and maybe, at least in this one crucial way, it's true.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Bruce has to run the scan a second time, a third, before he feels able to let any of the tension bleed from his shoulders. But all the results are the same: no trackers, delayed-release capsules, or subdermal devices of any other kind are showing up.

"Negative again, sir?"

Bruce glances over his shoulder. Alfred had been solicitous, at first—suffocatingly so, in point of fact. He'd come onto comms in time to hear the weird loud rush of air coming from Bruce's microphone, and to see the monitor tracking Bruce's in-suit locator issue wild alerts and then settle all at once on Heroes Park. He'd realized something had gone wrong, though he'd had no way to ascertain what, and he'd guided the Batwing to the park in the hope of redressing that lack.

But once Bruce had described the sequence of events to him, succinctly but accurately, and had, in stripping out of the suit, given him the opportunity to determine that Bruce was indeed fully healed, he'd reverted to a comfortable and unflattering skepticism about Bruce's every action since.

"Your tests?" Bruce says shortly.

"All negative as well," Alfred says. "The logs are intact, Master Wayne, and I will happily go through them with you. As I believe I've mentioned, there quite simply was no time."

Bruce grits his teeth. He has no reason to doubt Alfred's accuracy; the logs will only serve to confirm. Alfred has been very consistent regarding the timeline of Bruce's apparent arrival inside the alien vessel, the moment Superman had issued his instructions to his ship and the moment he'd addressed Bruce directly—that Bruce had woken immediately after. The gap that existed was so small; Superman had not spoken during it. And yet—

And yet surely it's impossible that the alien should have failed to take advantage of the opportunity. There could be no other benefit in allowing Bruce to leave the vessel alive. There must be something, something injected or implanted, some drug or infection or foreign substance that's been introduced into his system. There _must_ be. No other option makes sense.

Bruce has been nothing but a thorn in the alien's side, has ignored his requests and provoked his temper and antagonized him at every step of the way. It's impossible that Superman should have had Bruce on his ship, unconscious, helpless, and just—saved him.

(Impossible. Given what the alien knows of Batman, what he's seen, and all of it infuriating to him, as he'd demonstrated so clearly at the top of the clocktower; to think that he should nevertheless assign Bruce's life such value—that he should decide not to let Bruce come to harm, to be careful—gentle—

Impossible. Bruce can hardly trust Superman more than he trusts himself; and Bruce has no faith in his own gentleness.

What could ever make him capable of believing in Superman's?)

It defies all sense, all logic. What could possibly have motivated it? What long-term plan does it advance—what goal does it bring within reach? If there's no obvious benefit to be gained by it, no clear advantage, all that means is that Bruce is missing something; all that means is that some critical factor has been left out of his analysis. And if he doesn't figure out what it is, he'll be disastrously unprepared for the alien's next move.

"In point of fact," Alfred is saying, "if anything, all my results show improvement."

"What?"

Alfred affects surprise. "Surely you noticed it, Master Wayne," he murmurs, and steps closer, leaning in to point to the scans on the monitors in front of Bruce. "Your shoulder—the scarring used to cut through the muscle, just there. It's been dense enough to show on this particular set of tissue scans for years."

And he's not wrong; but on the scan, it's dark. Bruce blinks, and then absently draws his shirt-collar to the side—but the scar itself is still there, and all of its companions, pale shadows across his skin. It's the muscle damage alone that appears to be gone.

Bruce automatically adjusts the display. His knee; the opposite hip; his back. The metatarsals in one foot, which hadn't ever quite healed correctly—the lump of an awkward collarbone break. Gone.

"'Whatever you have to'," Alfred quotes; his tone is low, wondering.

"He didn't give specific parameters," Bruce says absently, still staring at the scan. "You saw the suit."

It had been unmissable, the moment Bruce had arrived under halfway decent lighting: where that mysterious blade had penetrated the suit, the gaping slice left behind—the ship had repaired that, too. Except it apparently had not had the materials on hand to replicate the armor's various layers with precision, and had instead done its best to approximate. The material it generated is black, but that's all it has in common with the armor; it has a strange tessellated sheen, a flexibility and elastic give that seems almost semi-organic in nature. Bruce hasn't worked out a strategy for taking samples just yet, but—

But perhaps the other dividend of this evening's events will be of use there.

"And the knife?"

"Nothing enlightening as yet, sir," Alfred reports. "The material has so far defied all attempts at identification—which I suppose does suggest a hypothesis of its own."

Superman had pulled the blade out of Bruce and had simply discarded it in the pool; Bruce had been able to locate it and palm it without too much trouble. The alien didn't seem to have given it a second thought—but then he possessed every weapon he needed, even empty-handed. Or perhaps he had wanted Bruce to take it—

"And no evidence of tracking equipment there, either?" Though perhaps it doesn't matter, if the alien's calibrated his ship's sensors to whatever strange metal the blade was forged from. And Alfred is entirely correct: the more difficulty they have analyzing the metal, the more probable it seems that the knife, too, is alien.

"No," Alfred says, a little shortly. Bruce glances at him, and he's looking right back, arms crossed and eyes narrowed, one corner of his mouth twisting down. "Master Wayne, is it truly so implausible that Superman might have carried you off to his ship to heal you of a potentially fatal wound simply because he wanted to help?"

"If he's the one who gave that knife to Luthor in the first place—"

"And why on Earth—or any planet one should be inclined to choose—should he have done that? Have we not been operating all this time under the tentative conclusion that Luthor is endeavoring to _hinder_ him?"

"Perhaps we underestimated the complexity of their plans," Bruce says, deliberately flat and even. If Alfred intends to accuse him of irrationality—

Except Alfred isn't looking at him contemptuously or judgmentally. Alfred isn't looking at him at all; he's set his palms against the desk, bent his head and squeezed his eyes shut, and the line of his shoulders is—bowed. He looks nothing so much as tired.

"Perhaps you even now underestimate a great many things, sir," Alfred says, very low.

"I have to _understand_ it," Bruce finds himself saying, before Alfred can continue—and he shouldn't be blurting it out like this, should have better control of himself, but it's _true_. "You know that I—I have to understand it. I have to make sense of it."

"I do, Master Wayne," Alfred says after a moment, and he isn't so far away anymore—he's turned away from the desk, looking up again, and he settles a hand on Bruce's arm and says it again, as if Bruce somehow might not have heard the first time: "I do know that."

"And if there wasn't some advantage in it—"

"There may well have been, sir," Alfred murmurs, "but consider: how might 'advantage' be defined? In combat, Superman has every advantage he could ask for; there is none remaining that he need seek. Perhaps, then, it was another sort of opportunity he was looking for this evening."

"And what might that be?"

"The opportunity to do a kindness when no one else could."

Bruce bites down on a scoff; Alfred looks at him as though he heard it anyway, wry and resigned. But he doesn't get angry with Bruce again, doesn't withdraw—he squeezes Bruce's elbow, after a moment, and tilts his head.

"Perhaps you forget, sir, that I'm well aware you are familiar with the concept," he adds, gaze impossibly warm. And then he lets Bruce go, clasps his hands behind his back and clears his throat. "And before I can forget in all this confusion: our friend was willing to share a great deal, once I acquainted her with the particulars of our situation. She's been tracing a series of—investigations that Luthor seems to be undertaking at the moment, and she passed along some files that might be of interest."

"Thank you, Alfred," Bruce says.

It doesn't come out quite as brisk as he meant it to; but Alfred doesn't tease him for it, only smiles and then turns to head back downstairs.

 

 

 

Alfred's _friend_ has good judgment; the files are absolutely of interest.

It's nothing Luthor had been keeping particularly secure. Bruce remembers Alfred's assessment of his friend's technological competence: fair, but nothing that could get her into the Cave's systems, and certainly not without Bruce or Alfred noticing. Luthor's digital security isn't that good—but it isn't too far behind, either, and especially not when it comes to Luthor's most interesting projects. Bruce could crack it, but it would take time, and so far it hasn't seemed worth the risk. Not until he has a better idea what he should be looking for, at least.

But Alfred's friend hasn't delved all that deep. The more Bruce looks, the more apparent it becomes that she hasn't actually taken anything Luthor's likely to have considered worth securing. It's the context she's provided for what she does have that renders the whole of it so valuable.

The e-mails come from LexCorp addresses—but they didn't stay internal, which must have made it much easier for Alfred's friend to get her hands on them. And there's not all that much in them, long vague inquiries punctuated by a few names: Debbie Sue, Bright Arctic, Pete Ross—Smallville.

Smallville. Bruce is already frowning at the screen as he flicks further through the files, and then all at once finds himself staring at the reason why. Not a LexCorp file, but a collection of images, linked video clips, a few inches of news copy. That's right: the aliens hadn't only caused damage to Metropolis. The one other place on all the face of the earth that had suffered their impact, aside from Metropolis and its antipode, had been the town of Smallville.

Where—Bruce scrolls back to check, runs a search of his own—where Pete Ross had lived when he was a boy. And—

And Lane. Lane had gone there.

Bruce stares at the e-mail, grudging corroboration that Lane had passed through town offered after a LexCorp employee begins to apply some less-than-subtle pressure. Luthor hasn't just been tracking Lane since Black Zero; he's been _back_ tracking, retracing her steps in the months leading up to her conversation with Woodburn. Before the aliens arrived, it would have been almost impossible to narrow down the possibilities—judging by Luthor's inquiries, Lane had left a broad zigzagging track across the continent. But once the attacks on Black Zero Day are factored into the equation, Smallville is suddenly outlined in marquee lights. Because there were only two things the aliens had given any evidence of caring about: destroying the world, and—

_General Zod invited me up onto his ship. Did you know that? He took me up there and he told me what he was going to do, and he wanted me to help him. He thought I'd be tempted._

_All I've ever wanted to do with the world is live in it. All I ever wanted, growing up, was—_

_Earth's the only home I've ever had, Mr. Wayne._

Bruce stares at the monitor without seeing it. Independent verification; that's what he's been lacking, that's the gap he's never quite been able to close alone. Batman had done what he could, and Bruce Wayne had gone where Batman couldn't, had learned more about Superman than Bruce had ever thought would be possible, but only from Superman. And Bruce

(—can hardly trust Superman more than he trusts himself—)

can't possibly treat the alien as a credible source. Not without a _reason_ ; there has to be a reason. He has to be basing his actions, his decisions, on something other than

(—those eyes, the intensity; the sheer unwavering sincerity etched into every line of that hopelessly perfect face—)

what the alien tells him—what the alien wants him to believe.

_I was a child._

Bruce squeezes his eyes shut, rubs absently at his forehead. Superman had—had appeared honest; had dropped that tidbit in so casually, hadn't drawn Bruce's attention to it, hadn't had any reason to expect that Bruce would follow up on it or draw the conversation in that direction. Unless he _could_ read minds, or god knew what else—unless he had been manipulating Bruce throughout the entire conversation.

So: if Bruce follows up on this and discovers Superman had in fact been lying about that, nothing else will matter. He'll know, once and for all, with absolute certainty, that anything the alien has said to him can be discounted in its entirety. And if Superman's been telling the truth all along

(—if Bruce trusted him, even if only for ten minutes, and were given no reason to regret it—)

then Bruce will have some context for—for understanding that truth, for learning just who Superman is.

Can't have been all that many kids in Ross's grade; it's as good a place to start as any. Bruce pulls up his own roundup of property damage assessments in Smallville, and then flips back through Alfred's friend's file to start at the beginning. Whatever clues there are in here, whether Luthor realized what he had or not, Bruce is going to find them.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Clark feels a little silly for it afterward, but it honestly doesn't occur to him to put the pieces together until they're piled up right in front of him.

In his defense, most of the problems Superman deals with on a day-to-day basis are pretty one-and-done—accidents and fires and natural disasters aren't part of some kind of greater scheme, aren't being plotted and then secretly executed by some power-hungry egomaniac behind the scenes. He does remember Lois mentioning Lex Luthor, that Batman had drawn that connection for her and then had started following Jimmy after. But it's all kind of abstract to him; yeah, okay, maybe Luthor is out there and he's got something on his mind, but right _now_ there's a four-car pileup on 4th Avenue and Clark's already a little bit late.

Except once he does get to work and pulls Jimmy aside to check on him, Clark Kent's innocent and ignorant concern, the first thing Jimmy says to him is, "Oh—Lois told you, huh? Yeah, I'm fine, Kent. Thanks for asking, man. You know she thinks it was Luthor?"

"She does?" Clark Kent says, blinking and bewildered, pausing to push his glasses up his nose.

"Yep," Jimmy says, with the vaguely shell-shocked resignation of somebody whose worldview has had to rearrange itself around the idea _a Metropolis business magnate I've never met may in fact be trying to have me murdered_. "Sounds nuts, right? But—she told you about, uh, our friend?" He makes a motion with his hand that might, if Clark were generous, resemble the spread wings of a gliding bat.

"Yeah, she mentioned something like that," Clark Kent says with a smile, clapping Jimmy on the shoulder. "I don't know, it all sounds a little too exciting for me."

"Hey, Lois is the one breaking all the big stories," Jimmy says, shaking his head, mouth quirking wryly. "I just take the pictures."

And then Jimmy nods and steps away, and Clark stands there staring after him and thinks about it. After a moment, he realizes he's making an obstacle of himself and takes a step over to one side of the hallway; and he thinks about it. And then he walks slowly back to his desk and sits down, and thinks about it.

Because it makes as much sense as anything else. Doesn't it? Setting aside the part where Clark barely knows enough about Luthor to picture the man's face if he tries, the part where he has no idea why Luthor gives a good goddamn about Superman—there is _something_ going on, surely. Batman hadn't been following Jimmy and Lois just to be creepy; that had been a side effect, maybe, but not the goal. He'd taken Lois aside to talk to her about his suspicions, had dropped Luthor's name into the mix. And then he'd shown up and stopped Jimmy from getting tangled up in what seemed to have been some kind of setup, and—

And if Luthor—or whoever— _had_ been behind that setup, maybe Batman's interference had pissed him off. Enough that he'd try to kill Jimmy?

Clark rubs at his mouth. It seems almost ridiculous, except that it does sort of fit. Because Jimmy's paying attention now; he's got his eyes open, Batman's warned him, and so what use is he to whatever weird scheme Luthor's got up his sleeve? Why _not_ get him out of the way? And do it in front of Lois, too, just to scare her, because it's not like Luthor knows her well enough to realize that only means she'd never let it go—she'd keep pushing until she found out why Jimmy died, and who had done it.

But if you thought about it from a distance, if you couldn't or wouldn't bother to fill in the details, if she and Jimmy were just abstractions to you, then it was almost logical. In a callous, casually horrible sort of way.

And as if Lois can hear him thinking, that's the moment she walks up and raps her knuckles against his desk.

Clark Kent shouldn't have heard her coming, if he'd been spacing out that hard—Clark jerks a little, glances up and blinks, and says, "Hm?"

"Hey, Smallville," she says briskly, and then leans in a little closer and adds, "Our friend get out okay, last night?"

"Oh—yeah," Clark says quickly, reaching up to adjust his glasses a little. "Yeah, he's fine."

"Any trouble?"

"Nah, nothing serious." Clark waves a hand. "I mean, you know how he is: real, um, bundle of sunshine. But he's all right. Or, well, he was," and Clark pauses and then hears himself add, "I'm going to check on him again later," and discovers to his surprise that he means it.

Lois's face does something sort of complicated that ends with her mouth tugging up at one corner. "He's going to love that," she murmurs, and then claps Clark on the shoulder. "Well, I just wanted to let you know—that thing I was looking into for you?"

Luthor, Clark assumes, and whatever connection he does or doesn't actually have to this whole mess. "Yeah?"

Lois shrugs a shoulder. "Might have legs."

And her tone is casual, but Clark glances up and meets her eyes and can see the steady, earnest intensity in them, can read the measured curve of her raised eyebrow. She found someone who knows something, maybe more than one someone, and whoever it is, they didn't tell her Batman was kidding himself.

"Not sure yet," Lois is adding, "but—take care of yourself. Okay?"

"Sure, sure," Clark says, smiling up at her; and then once she's moved away, he leans back in his chair and links his hands behind his head. For a moment, his chest is tight, choked with the sudden weight of old, heavy fears—but this isn't like Zod. Clark has a chance to figure this out, to learn who Luthor is and why this is happening. It's not going to be like Black Zero. It doesn't have to take him by surprise; he can be ready.

He can be ready, and this time he can make sure no one else gets hurt.

 

 

 

But first he needs to be certain no one else has been hurt already.

It's funny in a couple of different ways that Clark should have ended up hanging in the air over Gotham at night, looking for Batman. Not just the reversal, that Batman should have started out tracking Superman down and now Clark's the one scoping their twin cities like a creep, but the way everything else has changed. The way Clark's learned to look at Batman, and at himself; that Batman's not just some paranoid whackjob with a thing about Superman, but that he might actually be onto something; and that Clark couldn't have done any of it without—

Without Bruce Wayne, actually.

Clark huffs half a laugh, but—but it isn't untrue. Hell, if Wayne hadn't held him up outside the gala in the first place, Wally Keefe might have missed Clark entirely. Funny, the little coincidences that can change everything that comes after. And, yeah, also funny: that Bruce _Wayne_ , of all people, should have given him what he needed to finally do—well, not the right thing, not yet. But something better than before, at least, with Batman. Something good.

He'll have to thank Wayne for it, after all this gets sorted out. Maybe fly some flowers up to one of his penthouse suites with a thank-you note.

Unless Wayne drops by the ship again first, of course. And Clark shouldn't think about that and find himself kind of looking forward to it, even hypothetically; but he is.

Not that it matters now: Batman first, Luthor second, the rest later. Clark closes his eyes and concentrates, listens—because he thinks he's starting to get a feel for it, for the way Batman sounds. Not any one thing, the breath or that steady even heartbeat, the rustle of fabric or the quiet hiss of that communicator channel, but all of them together, the particular flavor of their combination in just the right ratios. A portrait in soundscapes, and in its own way just as recognizable as the cowl or the black-on-black silhouette.

And—there it is. Clark smiles into the dark, and dives for it without even opening his eyes.

An empty lot, this time; or empty but for the big dark van parked off to one side. Even as Clark slows, settles his feet down onto the pavement, one of the men huddled around the back of the van jerks sideways with a muffled cry—and then another, another. Clark darts forward and catches the last one around the chest, just as a shadow flows forward to strike the guy in the neck. He sags in Clark's grip, and Clark ignores Batman's glare in favor of lowering him carefully to the ground. Heartbeat's fine; he'll be okay.

"You."

Clark glances up, and tries not to smile too widely. Knowing Batman, he'd probably take that the wrong way. "You," he agrees.

And from below—Clark's distantly startled by the urge to shiver, because Batman cuts a genuinely imposing figure, all broad dark lines and flat stare. Still, but not with caution or hesitation; only just leashed, that's all, and not by Clark's presence but by his own choice.

"Friends of yours?" Batman growls, after a long beat of silence.

"What? Oh—no, nothing like that," Clark says, belatedly straightening up. "No. I just wanted to make sure you were all right." He clears his throat. "Are you?"

Batman doesn't move, and his glare acquires a certain witheringly judgmental quality. "You came here just to ask me that."

It's not delivered like a question, but Clark doesn't know what to do with it except answer it. "Yes? I've never asked the ship to do anything like that before. I'm glad it worked."

"You are."

"Yes," Clark says, and more firmly this time. Because it's true, after all. "I never wanted you dead—even at the beginning, I didn't want that. You have to know I didn't want that. And now—"

"Now?" Batman bites out.

"You're helping me," Clark says quietly. "Aren't you? That's why you were there at all, with Mr. Olsen and Ms. Lane. You're onto something, something that has to do with Lex Luthor, and you knew he might go after them."

Batman doesn't answer; but he doesn't leave, either, doesn't melt away into the darkness or turn and climb up onto the familiar glider hovering overhead. He stands there, watching Clark with a steady dark gaze, cape trailing in a black swath across the pavement.

And maybe that's an answer of its own. "Don't you see? Whatever it is you know, whatever Luthor is doing—he's after me, isn't he? We can help each other with this. I'm not saying you need to trust me," Clark adds quickly, when Batman tenses. "You don't even have to like me," and maybe he's kidding himself, but maybe that was almost a laugh that Batman just huffed through his nose. "But knowing what Luthor is up to matters to us both—"

"I work alone," Batman interrupts, low, stern, like he can't see how that's anything but the last word.

"But you don't have to," Clark says. "I— _we_ don't have to. I told you to leave me alone, and you didn't do it—"

"Neither did you."

"—so work _with_ me instead," Clark says, and he shouldn't have let that come out so pleading, but—but it all seems so simple, so obvious. Because he'd never wanted to be alone in the first place; and now he doesn't have to be. "Just for a little while. Just until we figure this out. Then you can go back to surveilling me, or sneaking around interrogating everyone I talk to, or whatever else you want to do."

He pauses for a moment, and then extends a hand. Nothing like the last time he'd shaken anybody's hand, the bright shining ballroom of the Padovano Building, lights everywhere and a thousand people lined up in front of him; it's dark and overcast, a mist of rain starting to pick up, and it's not for the sake of pleasantries, standing in this dim grimy lot with Batman staring at him—this time, it matters.

Batman doesn't move.

Clark waits. It's not like it's costing him anything to be patient, to stand there through the flick of Batman's gaze to his hand, his face, his hand again—not next to what he could gain by it.

"No," Batman says at last, almost gently.

"Okay," Clark says, but he keeps his hand where it is, open, outstretched. "But I mean it, and I'm not going to take it back. We aren't on opposite sides of this. I won't forget that, and neither should you."

"And you shouldn't be so quick to offer your hand," Batman murmurs, very low, "to anyone who'll take it."

"I haven't regretted it yet," Clark says, and for some reason that makes Batman's gaze sharpen abruptly.

"You will," he says, and then there's a sudden flash of blue—police lights, sirens, and Clark turns to judge for himself how close they are. He does hear the hiss of cable, the swish of cloth; but there's still a wistful disappointed weight in his chest, when he turns back around and Batman is gone.

Clark could follow him. Could, and wants to—wants to keep asking, offering, wants to make it so clear that he's not giving up on this that even Batman has to believe him. But—

But Batman probably wouldn't appreciate it, and Clark doesn't even have to. Because Batman hadn't told him he was wrong about Luthor, and that means their paths are going to cross again, surely. Clark just has to be ready when they do.

 

 


	5. Let go.

 

 

**Let go.**

_Release your grip with a smile! Don't make a production out of concluding a handshake; there's no need to push your partner's hand away, for example, or to yank your own back too quickly. Just allow your hold to loosen and then draw your hand away, bringing the handshake to a quiet and graceful close._

 

There's a bell over the door at Ralli's; it jingles as Bruce steps inside. He doesn't pause to scope the place out. He walks in, like anyone might, and smiles politely at the first waitress who catches his eye before seating himself at a booth with a decent view of the TV. He looks absorbed in his phone—pure coincidence, surely, that the waitress passing him at the moment he lifts his head to ask for some coffee is another woman entirely.

"No problem, honey," she says with a smile.

"Thank you," and Bruce leans in a little, flicks his gaze down to her nametag, before he adds, "Martha."

He hadn't—practiced. Had only mouthed it, once or twice, into the rearview mirror before parking. Just to make sure he could do it; that his throat wouldn't close on it without warning, that he could say it as though it were any other name.

It had filled him with clear cold certainty, that first moment his gaze had fallen upon it. _Martha Kent_ , he had read, and had drawn half a dozen conclusions at once, somewhere far away from himself. A good thing, that he hadn't given in to the temptation to reach for the alien's outstretched hand, or to believe any of those soft steady words—because what could this mean except that the alien had known who was beneath Batman's cowl from the beginning? For years, potentially, to have set up this cover for himself early enough for Lane to stumble across; but he'd known, he _must_ have. Before the gala, before Black Zero, before he'd ever put on the uniform—somehow, somehow, he'd known, and he'd chosen this woman, deliberate, aware that one day Bruce would have to look at her and smile and say her name—

And if the alien were controlling her, or reaching into her mind, who knew how she'd react to Bruce's presence? Bruce had braced himself for anything.

But Martha Kent just nods at him politely and hustles off, and when she comes back with a steaming pot of coffee she doesn't throw it at him, doesn't pour it on him; she turns over the mug on the table in front of him with a clink and fills it neatly, catching the last sluggish drop on the rim of the coffeepot with a napkin before it can slide away down the side. "There you go," she says, brisk. "Cream? Sugar?"

"Black's fine, thanks," Bruce hears himself say, and he watches her smile again and can't decide what it means. Surely, _surely_ , it matters somehow

(—because everything does; nothing is harmless, and the things Bruce doesn't pay attention to are the things that will stab him deepest in the end. That's how it works, that's how it always—)

and he won't let himself be taken by surprise.

"Sure thing," she says warmly, and he doesn't stop her from walking away.

He stays where he is, and he drinks the coffee. It's not good, but it could be worse. The diner has the slow, easygoing pace of a place with a lot of regulars and plenty of open seats; Martha doesn't press him for an order, comes back around to top off the coffee and then leaves him to his phone.

The TV's set to a 24-hour news channel, and—as so many of them do, these days—this one fills the occasional thirty-second gap in its programming with brief notices about whatever daily Superman segment it has lined up for the evening. Bruce glances up at it with a look of mild interest, and then back at his phone, and if his gaze should trip across Martha Kent's face in between—

He can't stop himself: he snags, helpless. If the alien is in control of her, he's doing a terrible job; she's stopped short in the middle of wiping down a table, staring up at the TV screen with such raw worry and affection—it's the worst impression of someone with no personal stake in Superman's welfare that Bruce could possibly imagine. Even after the programming has moved on, she doesn't look away from the TV for a long moment. And then she does, all at once, too fast, swiping at the table with grim inattention, her mouth a flat tense line.

Bruce jerks his eyes away, forces himself to frown down at his phone. Another five minutes and Martha Kent is back again, and this time when she asks him if he wants a refill, he doesn't answer.

"Sir?"

He blinks and looks up. "What? Oh—yeah, sure. Thank you." He watches her pour, and then adds, "You live around here?"

"For a while now," Martha agrees, with a wry little quirk to her mouth that suggests this is an understatement. "Begging your pardon, but I'm guessing you don't."

"Not exactly," Bruce allows, smiling, and

(—it's hardly going to serve as a threat if the alien _doesn't_ know. It'll just be an odd coincidence, or—or Mr. Wayne prying where he's not wanted, as he's already proven so willing to do. Will the alien be angry? Will he shove Wayne into a wall, too? Or let Wayne make a joke about meeting the parents, go stern and disapproving, or—

—or tip his head back, bare that throat, and laugh—)

he holds out his hand and then says, "Bruce Wayne."

Martha's eyebrows jump, but that's the only sign she gives of having recognized anything about him; and she stops to wipe her free hand carefully on her apron before she reaches out to shake and says, "A pleasure, I'm sure."

Bruce grins, ducks his head exaggeratedly, and waits for her to smile before he wiggles the phone. "Just passing through, but I'm having a little trouble getting the GPS to cooperate. Don't suppose you could give me directions back to the interstate?"

"Sure—which way are you headed?"

Bruce makes something up, watches her forehead crease for a moment in thought. "Let's see," she murmurs. "You ought to head left out of the parking lot here, down to the corner where the hardware store was—it's a general store now, I think. And then just keep going past the old Langstrom place—"

She stops and raises an eyebrow at Bruce's expression, and he laughs and says, "You weren't kidding. You really know the area."

"Hard not to," she offers, "after forty or fifty years."

"You don't look a day over thirty," Bruce says immediately, and—and it's only right, for Bruce Wayne to sound warm and sincere, trying to pull off a line like that.

Martha laughs and shakes her head. "That's very kind of you, Mr. Wayne," she murmurs, and then shrugs a shoulder. "Suppose Smallville isn't for everyone, but it suits me well enough."

"Family?" Bruce says, ignoring the pounding of his heart.

And the look on her face then is so familiar it aches. "Not anymore," she says softly, and she smiles again but this time it's pinned on, perfunctory. "My husband, he—he passed away."

Bruce watches himself catch her wrist, hang on for one long stretched-out moment. "I'm sorry," he says; and he can see it in her eyes, the moment she remembers who she's talking to, the one thing even people out in Smallville know for sure about Bruce Wayne.

But she doesn't say it. She just looks at him, silent and knowing, and then turns her arm beneath his hand, squeezes his fingers gently, before she draws away. "And my son, Clark, he moved to the city about a year ago," she tells him instead, as if there'd been no break at all.

Bruce doesn't allow himself to freeze. He'd known this was coming; that was half the point. That's how he'd narrowed his way down to Martha in the first place—the list of Pete Ross's schoolmates had been even shorter than he'd hoped, and cross-referenced against a handful of Lane's inquiries, Luthor's, the overlap on the Venn diagram between them, only one name had been left in the end.

Clark Kent.

(It sounds different coming out of Martha Kent's mouth than it had in Bruce's head. _My son_. Superman, Bruce reminds himself; the alien—

— _my son, Clark_ —

—it's a lie, that's all. It must be a—)

"Clark," Bruce listens to himself repeat, and the smile that crosses Martha's face then is—

(—had Mom looked like that, when people said _Bruce_ to her? Had she—)

"No need to feel too sorry for me, Mr. Wayne," Martha says, touching the back of his hand. "He's a good boy—he visits."

Sure he did. What was it for Superman, a flight to Kansas? Two minutes? Or did he take the scenic route and make it five?

Bruce clears his throat. "Well, I'm glad to hear it. But I interrupted you, sorry—could you give me those directions one more time?"

 

 

 

She does; Bruce listens to them this time, repeats them back to her successfully when she tells him to and then thanks her.

"Oh, it was no trouble, Mr. Wayne," she says, patting the back of his hand again. "And you'll be all right the rest of the way?"

"Yeah," Bruce says, smiling up at her. "Yeah, you've been a big help. I know where I'm going now."

She waves off a tip, tells him the coffee was on the house. He waits for her to walk away and then drops some twenties on the table without counting them, and leaves.

He crosses the parking lot with an easy, relaxed stride, half his attention still on his phone as he unlocks his car and slides into the driver's seat. And then he sets the phone on the passenger seat, puts his foot on the brake and his hands on the wheel, and stares out the windshield without seeing it.

That was foolish. He should have—should have taken scans, should have prepared a sequence of questions in advance; done something, anything, that could tell him something useful about the extent of the alien's influence on—

On Martha.

He closes his eyes, keeps his breathing ruthlessly even.

The truth was that he had barely prepared properly for this at all; he'd been seized by a terrible fixated sense of urgency, the moment he'd seen Martha Kent's name written out in front of him. As if

(—acknowledge it, even if you can't eliminate it. _Acknowledge_ it, damn you—)

she were in danger, as if a clock were ticking down. As if Superman had constructed himself in every respect to prey on Bruce's deepest vulnerabilities, had merely saved this one for last.

Clark Kent had gone to school with Pete Ross. Had lived with his parents, Martha and Jonathan, on a farm in Smallville; had applied to college but hadn't gone, had left town abruptly after his father's death and had—

Had found an alien ship, somewhere, and learned what he was.

Bruce's hands are wrapped so tightly around the steering wheel that his knuckles are aching, bone-white; he stares down at them and then eases them carefully loose, and then in a single vicious burst of motion slams the heel of his palm into the body of the wheel with a thud.

The alien is a threat. He must be. He's capable of anything, of everything. He

(— _he's a good boy, he visits_ —)

isn't stupid. Is he? Why go to all this trouble? Why argue with Batman, again and again, and leave him unharmed every time—and then heal him, the one time harm came to him from elsewhere? Why give every appearance of having only just worked out that Luthor might pose a problem, if he could pull as much straight out of Luthor's mind for himself?

He'd found the ship, he'd learned what he was. It had told him that his biological parents were gone, that the planet he'd come from was dust to dust; an abstraction at best, when his father's death still weighed him down, when his mother was behind him in Smallville, when the only world he could remember was solid beneath his feet. Where had he been, that day Zod's face had appeared on every screen on the planet? Out on a fishing boat? Standing in the ship? Staring at one of the TVs in Ralli's, right where Bruce had been five minutes ago?

He couldn't have expected it. He'd thought everyone like him was gone; he'd thought he was alone. And then General Zod had arrived to prove him wrong, and Superman—

And Clark had killed him. Had chosen Earth, and had destroyed all that remained of his people to preserve it, except the ship and himself.

It had made no sense to Bruce before. It had been ridiculous, implausible. What motivation could the alien possibly have to make such a decision in such a way? What power could contrive to force him to, to guarantee that he would always make it the same way again—that it would matter to him to do so? Superman had been opaque, impossible to analyze, when surely that choice had about as much impact on him as the flip of a coin. But—

— _he wanted me to help him. Can you imagine that? He thought I'd be tempted. When all I ever wanted, growing up, was_ —

But for Clark Kent, maybe it hadn't been much of a choice at all.

 

 

 

Bruce drives back to the airfield, leaves the car to be collected; the plane is waiting for him, refueled and made ready once he'd called ahead from the road. He settles into a seat and gazes out the window, fingertips pressed to his mouth, carefully expressionless, for the entirety of the flight back to Metropolis.

It had been sunny in Kansas, but the plane descends through a bank of clouds, light rain spattering the windows, as they come in for a landing. Bruce manages to recover sufficient control to do the barest minimum of research on the drive back to the lake house, enough to confirm that the answer had been right there waiting for him all along: Clark Kent works for the Daily Planet, in the same office as none other than James Olsen and Lois Lane. No wonder Superman had been so well-informed about Batman's interactions with them; he doesn't just keep in touch with Lane, he sees her in person every day.

A stroke of luck, that Kent should be a reporter. Even as Bruce waits for the car to slow, ducks out the open door and strides toward the door of the lake house, a strategy is coming together: if Bruce Wayne should insist on having one particular staffperson at the Planet be assigned to all Wayne Enterprises coverage, including interviews, the arrangements will be made. He can keep tabs on Kent—on the alien's movements out of uniform. He's well-positioned to make the most of this sudden wealth of intelligence, and if Superman truly has nothing to hide—

He stops short, blinking, halfway across the threshold.

"Sir," Alfred says, blinking back. "A bit earlier than I'd expected. Is everything all right?"

Bruce remembers, dimly, that he'd tacked an extra half-hour onto either side of the estimate he'd given Alfred—in case Martha Kent had done something unexpected, or there had been some other trouble.

But Alfred isn't alone. "Fine, fine," Bruce says with a smile, and then raises an eyebrow pointedly in the direction of the woman sitting on the other side of the table. She's gracefully and appreciatively cradling a cup of tea, and everything about the way she's holding herself, the lines of her arms and shoulders, her profile, is impossibly striking—

Striking, and familiar. Bruce keeps his smile where it is, looking at her and certain, _certain_ , that he knows her; and then in a single smooth motion, she stands, and all at once he remembers.

"You were at the gala," he murmurs. "The woman in green."

"Yes," she says, with a dulcet smile. "I'm afraid I missed any opportunity to introduce myself at the time. Call me Diana."

Bruce flicks a glance at Alfred. "Your congenial friend."

"Just so," Alfred agrees, eyebrows climbing. "Goodness, what a remarkable coincidence."

Diana's gaze flicks to him, and all at once her smile is indefinably warmer. "Always such a gentleman," she says, wry and sweet at the same time. "But the benefit of the doubt is unwarranted, in this case," and then she looks back at Bruce. "I was at the gala, and I saw you on the steps with Superman. I—had reason to believe there was more to you than met the eye."

"So you decided to have a look around," Bruce concludes.

Diana inclines her head—and Alfred's mouth is tightening, his whole face darkening, all the easy relaxation gone from the line of his back. Which would be entirely warranted, except—

"The information was good."

Alfred glances at him, and then back at Diana.

"I was entirely sincere in every respect, I assure you," she says. "I became aware recently that I had misplaced something very important to me. There weren't many people who could have taken it; Luthor was one of them. I was collecting more information in an effort to narrow down the list when I discovered the files I sent to you.

"I realized, as you have, that it was related in some way to Superman. The gala seemed like an excellent opportunity to learn a little more about him. At the time, I had no intention of involving myself further—and then you demonstrated that you were involved already. If I could share what I knew with you ..." She shrugs one elegant shoulder. "You seemed determined to act, one way or another; better that you should act from an informed position."

Bruce swallows a laugh. Informed. Is that what he is, now?

"At the time," he repeats, aloud. "And now?"

She pauses for a moment, and then her gaze leaps lightly, almost tentatively, back to Alfred. "Now I've remembered how much I enjoy a well-prepared cup of tea," she says quietly.

Alfred doesn't smile; but the shadow that had swept across his expression lifts from it, and he settles back in his chair with a sigh, no longer so tensely at attention. "You are, as ever, too generous," he murmurs, and then the corner of his mouth does flicker up, just a little, before he looks at Bruce. "And the information was good."

"Yes," Bruce says.

His voice is steady; his tone is level. But Alfred's eyes narrow anyway, fixed on Bruce with a sudden additional intensity.

"I don't suppose it—changed anything," he says, after a beat.

Bruce looks away. "I'll be downstairs if you need me."

"Ah. Of course, sir," Alfred murmurs. "I'll just make up another cup for you, shall I?"

 

 

 

First things first: he needs to locate Kent.

On the one hand, Luthor's data was incomplete; Bruce had had to push through another half-dozen levels of analysis, following up and connecting dots, before he'd been able to pinpoint Martha Kent. On the other hand, Diana hadn't been digging for it. Who knew whether she'd found everything? And time has passed since then. Luthor's research into Superman's background has almost certainly progressed further. Given the apparent complexity of his plans for Olsen, Lane, Wally Keefe, and the degree of his investment—presumably proportional to the time, money, and energy he's sunk into all this—it would be both stupid and arrogant to assume he's been unable to reach the same conclusions Bruce had arrived at this afternoon.

And if Luthor already knows Superman is Clark Kent—

Bruce might as well lay the groundwork for his next move. He pulls his phone from his pocket and dials the Planet; the office number, not the public line that goes to reception. It might take more than one call to get things set up the way he wants them—Perry White doesn't particularly like being told what to do. Might as well start now.

"Daily Planet, main office. How may I help you?"

"Hi," Bruce says warmly. "Clark Kent around, by any chance?"

"Uh—may I tell him who's calling?"

"Oh, sure thing. This is Bruce Wayne."

There's a moment's silence. "Hold, please!" whoever's on the other end of the line says, artificially bright, and then Bruce is treated to the sweet strains of a little afternoon elevator music.

But he barely even has a chance to grimace at it before it's gone.

"What do _you_ want?"

Lane. Lane bursting with barely-restrained hostility, to be precise; but Bruce does remember what she'd said, that first night Batman had approached her. _So it really wasn't Wayne?_ Superman—Kent—had told her about the gala, and for a little while there she'd been working off the entirely logical assumption that Bruce had had something to do with Wally's appearance. And what has Bruce Wayne done to endear himself to her since? Not a whole hell of a lot.

"Your voice is a little higher than I'd imagined," Bruce drawls, a careful hint of innuendo lurking behind the words.

"Clark Kent is out of the office at the moment," Lane bites out. "You're speaking to Lois Lane, but you won't be for very long—"

"Oh? You expect him back soon, then?" Bruce says, blithe and amiable, and forces his hand to relax against the desk instead of clenching into a fist the way it wants to.

"Can I take a message," Lane says flatly.

"No, no, that's fine. I'll just try again some other time." Bruce hangs up, and then stares down at the phone.

It's probably nothing.

He already has access to the Planet's servers; in the end, he doesn't even have to pry into anything further than the internally shared main office calendar. Clark Kent has neatly blocked out his whole afternoon with a chunk of solid goldenrod, neatly labeled "LexCorp Lab Public Tour".

And maybe Lane had had another reason to sound so pissed off, Bruce thinks distantly. Because nobody else in the office would have thought twice about seeing Kent head off to something like that; but Lane had to have known it was a terrible idea, even if she didn't know the exact degree to which that was truth. And whatever she'd said to him about it, Kent had gone anyway.

Fuck.

Bruce takes the stairs two at a time, and Alfred must catch the rattle of metal—he's already on his feet by the time Bruce reaches the top. "Master Wayne?"

"Alfred," Bruce says grimly, and that's answer enough.

"A communicator, sir—"

"No time. I'll swap the phone to comms mode."

"Sir—"

"There's a chance that Luthor is going to make his move today," Bruce says. "Right now. I have to go—"

"Sir," Alfred says again. "I applaud your sense of urgency, but I must insist upon making a single suggestion: perhaps it would be prudent for you to take along a plus-one."

Bruce looks at him, and then past him to Diana. And it should be ridiculous; but something about Diana's stance catches his eye, makes him look again.

"Please forgive me," she says to Alfred, and then she takes the edge of the table in one hand, pries it free of the glass top with a screech, and—crumples it.

The furniture in the lake house is custom-made; that particular table's frame is titanium.

"I know you prefer to work alone, Master Wayne," Alfred says, "but I believe Diana's assistance might prove valuable."

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

It's not hard for Clark to find a good position at the back of the tour group. The guide is pretty thorough, too, so it's easy to take a nice long pause in each new section of the labs—to look through all the walls and floors, extend his superhearing out into the building, without having to worry that he's going to walk into anybody.

This isn't the only lab Luthor has, but it is one of the largest. And whatever Luthor is doing, there has to be some—some kind of physical component, some space where materials are being collected, tested.

Because seeing Batman again had reminded Clark of the one thing he hadn't followed up on: the knife. All his focus had been on Batman, that night, and he'd pulled the blade free and tossed it away and then had utterly forgotten about it.

It's not inside the ship—he'd checked, and then had laughed at himself for it, because of _course_ Batman had had the sense to find it and keep hold of it right after being dragged back from the brink of death, and then the sheer nerve to sneak it out right under Superman's nose. And the poker face to pull it off, too.

But the ship had taken plenty of scans; the internal sensors had caught Clark and Batman when they'd first arrived, and of course the ship had been monitoring everything with precision within the genesis chamber. It had been ready and able to confirm that the knife had been made of Kryptonian metal—and if Luthor had sent that guy after Jimmy and Lois, then either he must have been the source of the knife, or Clark has even more problems than he's realized.

He squints through the floor a little more carefully, skipping across stacks of equipment he has no names for and the bodies of personnel moving around in the lower levels. And there—there, at last, is a flat white shape that refuses to resolve itself into clarity, weird and boxy. The outline of a room, Clark thinks, and the reason it looks so strange is because he can't see into it or through it, can't lend it any depth; it's resolutely two-dimensional, like this.

Which could be coincidence. Clark hasn't exactly been systematic about testing his own abilities. Maybe there's some kind of industry-standard material, some particular sort of fireproofing or radiation shielding—or hell, maybe it's just lead—that he can't see through, and Luthor has every reason to have a room covered in it. But it's something, and the more he knows about what Luthor's got in there, the better.

He glances up and works his way along the edge of the tour group, offering polite smiles and murmured apologies to the few people Clark Kent awkwardly bumps as he goes. If he can just get a better angle on the shielded room—there are footsteps down there, researchers going from lab to lab. And if one of them goes to the shielded room and opens the door, even for a moment, Clark might be able to get a look inside—

"Of course, of course—a pleasure to see you folks. Enjoying your tour, I hope?"

Clark doesn't let himself startle, just blinks and turns his head, Clark Kent's casual attention drawn. Because it's Luthor himself, Alexander Jr., who's striding down the corridor toward the tour group, a wide smile on his face, gaze flickering almost eagerly from face to face to face.

Clark should come up with a question for him, something Clark Kent would take the opportunity to ask. He should—he—

He swallows hard, once and then again, but it doesn't help with the sudden awful feeling clawing its way through his gut. It—it's like being nervous, frightened, but so solidly physical; is this—nausea? The throb in his head, the sudden weakness in his knees, and all of it steadily worsening as Luthor comes closer. Clark stares fixedly, helplessly, at that beaming face as it draws nearer, dimly aware that he has no idea what the expression on his own face might be doing—he can't spare any attention for it, every scrap of focus he can bring to bear suddenly required just to make sure he's not going to fall down or vomit all over Luthor's shoes. Jesus, what the hell is _happening_ to him?

"My pleasure, ma'am," Luthor's saying, shaking someone's hand, somewhere that must be really far away—except an instant later he's turned to Clark, reaching out, smiling smiling smiling.

Clark can, abruptly, hear his own ragged unsteady breaths; but are they really that loud, or do they just sound like it to him? And he—he needs to reach out, needs to act normal. His life has always depended on acting normal, and this is no different, no matter what's wrong—but he doesn't _want_ to touch Luthor, even the scattered thought of it is making his skin crawl; he _can't_ , can't make himself, can't imagine anything worse than getting one single inch closer to Luthor right now—

Luthor's smile hasn't faltered, not one jot, and his eyes are intent, even fervent, on Clark's face. And then he closes the distance himself, a single deliberate step—god—

"Gosh, Mr. Kent—not feeling too well, are you?" Luthor backs him up, slow, toward the wall; and there's a murmur rising somewhere beyond them, the—the tour group, but Clark can't pick individual voices out of the swell. He can't—he can't hear anything, can't see, everything distant and unfocused, and it's an effort beyond measuring just to lift his foot when Luthor pushes at him, just to stumble where Luthor is directing him until the wall's against his shoulders.

"You—"

"No, not feeling well at all," Luthor murmurs. "That is _so interesting_. Don't you think that's interesting, Mr. Kent?"

"You know my name."

"Yes! I do, Mr. Kent, I do know your name. I know all your names, in fact. I know exactly who you are."

No. No, no—

"Oh, yes, mmhmm. Yep." Luthor pats Clark's lapels, smooths them down solicitously. "But you—you have no idea, do you? I'm just a name to you. Right? You don't even know why this is happening."

Clark swallows again, squeezes his eyes shut; he—he can't hold the words in his head long enough to understand them, he can't _think_ —

"I'm just another ant, from up there. Imagine that. I couldn't believe my luck," Luthor adds, tone almost confiding, "when they told me you'd walked right in here! But a Luthor never lets an opportunity pass him by, as dear old Dad liked to say. And what a glorious opportunity this is, Mr. Kent.

"You see, labs like these need ventilation systems, built to very exacting specifications. And since you never know what kinds of situations will arise, well, I've made sure LexCorp goes the extra mile. These hallways can be sealed off completely—totally airtight. No chance of hazards or contamination escaping the labs, if there should be some emergency." Luthor pauses, deliberate. "Which of course also means no chance of anyone escaping the hallways, either. Funny, the way things can change, just depending on how you're looking at them. And cutting off the air circulation does mean that if something like nerve gas were released into this particular lobby, everyone would be dead in a matter of seconds." And then, friendly, genuinely curious, "Are you following me, Mr. Kent?"

Clark digs his fingers into the wall, marvels distantly at the bright unfamiliar jolt of—of _pain_. The other Kryptonians, they'd been able to hit so hard; and on the Black Zero itself, adjusting to the atmosphere. That had hurt. But Clark hasn't felt anything like it since.

But the sensation's sharp enough to cut through the muddle in his head, just for a moment. He blinks his eyes open, swallows again, takes a breath, and this one doesn't sound quite as much like a gasp. "What do you want?" he manages.

"Just one thing, Mr. Kent," Luthor says warmly. "One tiny little thing. Nothing, really, compared to some of the things you've done. I want you to hold onto something for me for a few minutes."

And he slides a hand into his pocket, draws it out: there's something caught in his fingers, gleaming green, and Clark—can't look at it, squeezes his eyes shut again and shudders against the wall, and he'd claw through it with his bare hands to get away from that _thing_ , whatever it is, except—

Except he can't. _Everyone would be dead in a matter of seconds._

No one else gets hurt. No one.

Clark keeps his eyes closed, grabs blindly for Luthor's hand—closes his fingers around the thing, the _stone_ , a cool smooth shard, and bites down hard on the helpless noise trying to scrape its way out of his throat.

"Wonderful, Mr. Kent! I really wasn't expecting you to be so cooperative. I realize under normal circumstances you'd have all kinds of other options, but then we must remember you aren't at your best just now. It's entirely understandable—"

Clark thinks for a moment, dimly, that he's just—lost track of the flow of Luthor's words, that his hearing's dropped away still further. But he breathes in, out, swallows again, and manages to peer weakly out at Luthor, and Luthor's mouth isn't moving anymore.

Luthor cut himself off, and he's taking a slow half-step away from Clark, head turned. Clark watches without understanding, blankly, and then it occurs to him that something must be happening—that he should look over, too, and see what it is.

His head is pounding, heavy; he has to turn it carefully, or he feels sure it might just roll off. But the wall is there, cool and dry, a perfect and comforting contrast against Clark's hot damp cheek, and the glasses make everything strange, small and too-sharp, but that's—

That's Bruce Wayne, pushing through the doors at the corner of the lobby, arm around the waist of a lovely woman who's almost familiar. "Sorry," Wayne says, breezy. "Am I late?"

He doesn't ask the question like he's particularly interested in the answer. But Luthor watches him walk in and then—smiles again? "No, no," Luthor says, "you're fine, Mr. Wayne, you're right on time," and then he gestures idly with one hand.

And even Clark can hear the sound of the doors behind Wayne locking themselves, right before a sheet of metal lowers out of the ceiling over them and seals into place.

 

 

 

There's a wave of uncertain noise from the tour group, startled cries and a flurry of overlapping alarmed questions aimed at the guide and at Luthor; Clark is dizzy with it, has to close his eyes again, but—but none of it is coming from Wayne, or his guest.

When Clark's able to look again, in fact, Wayne doesn't seem to have hesitated at all. He stops just a few strides from Luthor, the woman standing silently at his shoulder, and he's smiling too, bland and amiable. "Glad to hear it," Wayne says softly.

"I'll admit this is a surprise," Luthor says. "Here, in the midafternoon—a creature of the night like you."

Wayne's expression stays the same, genial and toothless; but something in his stance, the set of his shoulders, changes all at once. "Oh, you know how it is. Some things you just can't miss."

"So true! And it must be getting pretty dark out there," Luthor says, glancing at Wayne's sleeves, the floor—the scattering of drops Wayne's left on it.

That's right. It feels like hours ago, now, but when Clark had arrived for the tour it had already been raining a little; looks like it's only gotten heavier since.

"Just the way you prefer it," Luthor adds, and Clark—Clark must have missed something, must be fading in and out a little more than he realizes, because that doesn't make very much sense. None of it does. Right?

Except Wayne doesn't look confused, and neither does his friend. So it must just be Clark who's lost.

"But I'm glad you could make it, Mr. Wayne, I really am! Because I've been hoping to get a chance to talk to you. See, I think you might have something of mine—or maybe you've just seen it recently, but hopefully you can help me find it. It looks," Luthor adds brightly, "a bit like this," and he reaches into an inside pocket and pulls something out with a flourish.

A knife. But not just a knife: it has a familiar gray-bronze sheen to it. Clark was—Clark was just looking at the sensor records from the ship, zoomed in close, impossibly detailed.

Well, that settles it, he thinks blurrily. Luthor's definitely got a stash of Kryptonian metal somewhere. Good to know.

He wobbles a little against the wall, and his eyes trip past Luthor without him telling them to—and then sideways, and he finds himself looking at Wayne. Idle, mindless, just tracing the lines of that familiar face; though Wayne doesn't look all that much like himself right now, really. Not with that—that _sternness_ to him, the grim steady stare he's giving Luthor.

Clark closes his eyes and strains, and he's not even sure what for until it turns out to be there: on the very edge of what he can hear with Luthor's green stone in his hand, so quiet he can barely find it. The breath; a strong and even heartbeat; the shift of expensive fabric against itself, and the—

—the soft hiss of some kind of open line, a two-way radio or a phone no one's speaking into—

And, in the end, added up: recognizable.

Oh. Huh.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Bruce watches Luthor's smile widen. Nobody should ever have a look like that on their face when they're holding a knife in their hand.

But Luthor's eyes, in all their glittering unstable intensity, are fixed on Bruce; and he's shown absolutely no sign of having noticed that Diana is no longer anywhere near Bruce. So there are a few benefits to Luthor's monomaniacal preoccupation, at least.

"Yeah? Look familiar?" Luthor turns the knife one way, the other, displaying the flat of it to Bruce, the hilt, as if they're trapped in the middle of an infomercial instead of a locked-down lab. "It really is too bad, you know," Luthor adds, twiddling the blade in his fingers. "I had this—this whole grand plan, I'd worked it all out down to the smallest detail, and it was _so good_. I really think you'd have liked it.

"Because you were in it, too. Did you know that? Yeah, you were in it. And I'd have given you everything you wanted, everything you could have asked for. I'd have given you the chance to kill a god! How many people get that, am I right?" Luthor leans in, claps Bruce on the elbow, with an air of pure enthusiasm—bright, intent, companionable, like he expects Bruce to grin back and tell him that sounds _awesome_.

"How generous," Bruce says instead, flat.

"Oh, absolutely! On your own turf, even. Just you and him—your chance to prove you've really got what it takes. Wouldn't you have enjoyed that? Come on, be honest."

And Bruce stares into Luthor's beaming face and wants to spit in it, wants to tell him he's full of shit. But—

But it's all too easy to imagine. If Bruce hadn't gone to the gala, if his attention hadn't been caught by Wally Keefe—if he hadn't been forced, by slow grudging degrees, to widen the scope of his focus on Superman—

He hadn't wanted context, in the beginning, and he'd armed himself with a hundred reasons to ignore any that was offered to him. And if he'd gone on that way, if he'd spent another four or five months simmering in it and then Lane had gone to Nairomi, and—what? Superman had killed her? Killed Olsen? Or Amajagh, his men; one whole side of another country's war eliminated, because it would take Superman five minutes to do as much. What would Luthor have decided on?

Whatever it might have been, it would have been exactly the waking nightmare Bruce had been waiting for. And anything he'd wanted to do to Superman, after that—he wouldn't have needed an excuse. It would have been right, fitting; pre-emptively justified.

Luthor's smiling, still: but smaller now, truer. "Yes," he murmurs, low. "Yes, that's what I thought. You do your best, you always do your best; but you have to understand, it's not you. It's impossible, to be all-powerful _and_ good. It's impossible. You always have to pick." And then he reaches out, takes Bruce's hand in his, turns it over.

The hilt of the knife is smooth against Bruce's palm, cool, a comfortable weight.

"You have to pick," Luthor repeats, louder. "You can kill me, of course. I know that. But if you do that, everyone in this room will die in about, mm, seven seconds."

Bruce flicks a glance behind Luthor—the guide is doing her best to keep the rest of the group calm, standing quietly against the wall. But Luthor's not bothering to keep his voice down anymore, and a ragged little wave of cries, a panicked sob or two, swells up and breaks across the crowd.

"The specifications I'm looking at would allow it, sir, with only a little modification."

Bruce doesn't reach for his earpiece; but he can slide his free hand into the same pocket as his phone and tap its microphone, and Alfred will know it for the acknowledgment it is.

"Or," Luthor adds, "you can kill him."

Bruce closes his fingers around the knife, and turns.

It's the last thing he wants to do, right now. All the time he's spent staring Superman in the face, as Bruce Wayne and as Batman, arguing with him and insulting him, being threatened by him and threatening him in return—and this, at last, is the truly frightening thing: to turn and look at the alien and see—

—a man. Black hair; closed eyes. Glasses. Sweating, shivering, an unpleasant flush in his cheeks. Jeans, a plaid shirt—sleeves rolled up, and one forearm pressed to the wall, the other corded with the tension of the grip he has on an oddly bright green rock.

Hurting him, Bruce assesses distantly. Some kind of radiation, most likely, thrown off by the substance, and able to render him physically vulnerable in a way nothing else can. Luthor must have turned it up somehow. Maybe from some alien wreckage, a damaged power source of some kind; or maybe even pure accident, created during Black Zero by the disruption to the process those massive ships had been undertaking. Impossible, at this juncture, to say for certain.

A year ago—a month ago—this would have been a gift. Bruce would have grabbed with both hands after any opportunity to eliminate or even to simply blunt the threat Superman represented. But now

(—now he knows what it will mean: the ship, alone in the park, pried open and taken apart. Martha Kent getting a phone call, or—or glancing up at one of those TVs in Ralli's, seeing her son's body wheeled out of this building on a gurney. Clark Kent's empty desk, somewhere in the Planet office, and Lois Lane having to walk past it every day—)

it's a choice. A choice he doesn't want to make: kill a man, save a life. A life—a world; because every single person huddled weeping against the far wall has a Martha, or is someone else's.

No choice at all.

He's a step away, the knife in his hand, when Kent's eyes flutter open, glassy but relentlessly blue.

(Surely he'd have known right away, if he'd ever met Clark Kent. Surely he'd have realized the instant their gazes locked, the moment—

—the moment he'd shaken Kent's hand.)

"You," Kent mutters.

"I don't believe we've had the pleasure of being introduced properly, Mr. Kent," Bruce says, automatic, distracted by the inexplicable throb in his knuckles.

Ah—he's clenching his fingers much too tightly around the hilt of the knife. That's what it is.

"No, you—I know," Kent says, inane, and then, "I know you. I know it's you."

Oh. Not so inane after all.

Kent can't be blamed; he's clearly half out of his head with pain. It's up to Bruce to provide some kind of cover—not for Luthor, who evidently knows a great deal more than he should, but for anyone else in the room who's been paying the least attention; for the cameras Luthor undoubtedly has installed in all the corners. Bruce should affect bewilderment, opine that Kent is in the grip of some kind of delirium.

"It's you," Kent murmurs again.

"I'm sorry," Bruce hears himself say, the words so jagged it feels almost plausible that they should scrape on their way out—that that's why his throat is aching with such intensity. "I'm—I'm sorry."

"No, it's okay," Kent says, nonsensical. "It's okay. I understand. You know I understand."

(—General Zod had arrived, and Clark had killed him. Had chosen Earth—)

And of all the impossible things, Kent reaches out

(— _you shouldn't be so quick to offer your hand_ —

_I haven't regretted it yet._

_You will_ —)

and takes Bruce's hand in his own; gentle, careful, though he's still shuddering with the pain of holding Luthor's radioactive mineral so close to himself. He wraps his fingers around Bruce's, fingertips splayed between Bruce's own, around the hilt.

"You don't have to do it alone," Kent whispers, breathless, shaking. "I won't make you do it alone," and Bruce squeezes his stinging eyes closed; god, it must be enough time, please let it have been enough time—

It's viscerally horrifying, having been so recently acquainted with the sensation from the other side, to be on this end of the blade as it goes in. [Kent jerks, breath catching in a small choked sound, but his hand doesn't falter](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14505618/chapters/33512577).

"Oh, perfect," Luthor says, "great. A little deeper, though, just to be sure. I know you've got it in you, champ."

And surely, surely, it'll only be another moment; but Bruce realizes with a dim far-off terror that however far the rock has reduced Kent, it isn't far enough. "No," he says, "no, Kent—wait," but Kent is inexorable: he heard Luthor, and he doesn't know—

Alien blood shouldn't be so _red_ —

Bruce hears the sound of a strike, a hold, a clatter and a wave of gasps behind him, but he doesn't pay it more attention than is required to be sure it is what it seems to be. Kent's eyes have fallen shut; he slides a little against the wall, knees faltering, and Bruce gets an arm around him, behind him.

A squeal of metal. Bruce forces himself to turn and look, just in case, but Diana has already left Luthor unconscious on the floor and is having no trouble crumpling the lock-down barrier upward to free the doors. A blow, and the internal locks are broken, the doors swinging wide.

"Go on—go," Bruce shouts at the tour guide, and she scrambles across the room, eyes wide, and starts hurrying people out—

And then Kent settles more heavily still into Bruce's arms, and far, far too much blood is trailing its way across the width of Bruce's wrist.

"Kent," he says. "Kent," and for a moment he's trapped in a logjam, no idea where to begin: is Superman capable of healing damage like this, or is it just that he usually doesn't sustain it in the first place? If he can heal it, then better to pull the knife out, surely—

The green mineral: it's still in Kent's hand. Bruce keeps one hand steady around the knife, the wound, blood seeping hot between his fingers, and scrabbles with the other for Kent's—and he finds it, the rock glassy-smooth against his fingertips, but it won't come _loose_. Kent isn't letting him—

"Got to hold it," Kent is mumbling. "He said I—"

"It's over. It's over, everyone is safe now; you can let go of it. Kent—"

"—he said—"

"Kent, let it the fuck go," and it comes out strained, bitten off, but _Christ_ , Kent seems to have fifteen fucking fingers and every single one of them is wrapped around the fucking rock—

Kent gasps, stuttered, harsh with pain, and his grip falters for a split second; Bruce yanks the thing away in one sharp motion and then doesn't know what the hell to do with it. The further away it is, the better off Kent will be, but he can't just throw it on the floor in a Luthor building and leave it for somebody to find.

"Bruce," Diana says, at his shoulder, and Bruce lets her take half Kent's weight just long enough to shove the thing into one pocket of his suit jacket.

And they can't take Superman to a hospital, but they can't leave him here; and he can't have much more blood to spare than a human. Which means—

Bruce snorts, even though it isn't funny, and then lifts his head and meets Diana's eyes.

"We need to get to the ship. His ship, in the park—as fast as we can."

"All right," Diana agrees, and she eases one arm around behind Kent, and the other around Bruce. "Hold on, then."

 

 

 

Lucky, in the end, that Superman had been so thoughtless, that day the statue had been unveiled—he'd asked the ship to accommodate Bruce, and apparently he hadn't ever told it to stop.

The rain is a blur, one long wet lash of cold across Bruce's face, at the speed Diana is capable of carrying them, and he can't tell whether the crack of sound that accompanies their movement is the air around them or distant thunder. But the world abruptly resolves itself into place again around them in the park, the ship's vast curving hull slicked with rain above them. And when Bruce puts a hand to it and asks it to open for him, it does.

"Readings indicate the wound will not close without assistance," it tells him, unprompted, and suddenly what had been a level deck in front of them lowers itself down, a ramp forming through the floor. "Please proceed directly to the genesis chamber."

The round bay, the too-warm liquid creeping up Bruce's thighs, is all too familiar—he drags Kent into it with a splash, tugs the knife free and yells, "Come on, what are you waiting for?"

But the light doesn't come.

"Insufficient power," the ship says, with sudden urgency.

"What?" Bruce snaps.

"Insufficient power. The genesis bay is a low-priority system; it draws power from a secondary—"

"How do we charge it?" Bruce forces his tone level, frustrated with himself—he can't afford to waste time making the ship repeat itself. The ship had fixed him without trouble; but then a human-normal baseline had to be so much easier to reach. The sheer expenditure of energy required for every one of Superman's powers to function—of course it's proportionally more to ask. He should have realized as much.

The ship is briefly silent. "Processing," it says at last, because—because it doesn't usually have to strategize around the lack of anybody who can shoot lasers out of their eyeballs—

Fuck. _Fuck_. Bruce clutches Kent's slack arms a little tighter, tries not to look at the darkening liquid lapping against Kent's side; the genesis fluid is pale, and with the lighting in here Kent's blood looks nearly black by comparison.

And then, over Bruce's shoulder, Diana says, "Ship, is it possible to open this area to the sky?"

Bruce twists to look at her. She's still wearing the blue dress she'd come to meet Alfred in—it had been if anything a little too appropriate for a date of Bruce Wayne's, but there hadn't been time to make adjustments in any case. She strides easily into the pool, the skirt flowing loosely around her knees, and turns her face up into the first light tattoo of rain.

Because, as it turns out, it's entirely possible: the whole ceiling of the genesis pool is rearranging itself, infinite tessellating pieces shifting and folding and melting away. The wind has picked up, the rain sheeting in through the widening gap and stippling the fluid of the pool, and above them the belly of the stormcloud is low and dark and heavy.

"Diana—"

"Be ready," she says, coming to a stop at the pool's far edge, and then she closes her eyes.

And before Bruce can even be tempted to ask her what the hell kind of good that's supposed to do Kent, he feels it: something in the air changes. A tension, a crackle—and it isn't only figurative, the hairs on Bruce's arms and the back of his neck all at once on end. There's a—a light gathering around Diana, faint and sourceless but discernable, soft and golden, and the moment stretches, a held breath.

[And then lightning strikes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14505618/chapters/36382116).

Bruce is half-blinded with it, knocked back on his heels—for an instant, there is nothing but the light, blue-white and endless, and a sound so loud Bruce doesn't hear it so much as he feels it, as physical a sensation as a blow to the face.

But he keeps his grip on Kent, and as soon as it came, it has passed. He isn't electrocuted, doesn't topple into the pool and drown; when he can see again, he's still looking at Diana. Her eyes are closed, her face calm as a still lake, and her bare arms are crossed at the forearm in front of her—and, impossibly, wreathed in lightning from shoulder to wrist.

And then she reaches out and lowers her hands, the backs of her fingers just brushing the surface of the pool.

Bruce can't help but close his eyes against the brightness of it—a dozen forks of lightning at once leap from Diana's hands, snaking out across the pool in a single brilliant fan, afterimages flashing across the backs of Bruce's eyelids. For a moment he thinks that'll be the end of it, that it hasn't worked; but then he feels a sudden surge of foam against his hands where they're still wrapped tight around Kent's arms, a familiar slosh and seethe, and all at once the pool is washed with a wholly different sort of light.

And under Bruce's fingers, Kent moves.

Bruce moves with him, automatic, a counterweight as Kent lurches to get his feet under himself, grip shifting up to Kent's shoulders. Kent gasps and coughs, brings a hand up to shove his wet curls out of his face and knocks his own glasses off—but then he doesn't actually need them. So Bruce lets them drop into the pool with a splash, and doesn't let go of Kent.

"Jesus," Kent says, breathless, wiping at his face. "Jesus, what the—what the hell," and then his gaze jumps straight to Bruce and he goes suddenly still.

They stand there, staring at each other, rain still pouring in; Bruce tries and fails to convince himself to take his hands off Kent's shoulders, and then Kent reaches up and carefully, gently, settles his own hands around Bruce's wrists.

He's looking at Bruce uncertainly—cautiously.

Because he knows, now. He'd come to some kind of conclusion back in Luthor's lab; and even if he hadn't, Batman's the one he'd used the pool on before. Bruce Wayne shouldn't know a thing about it.

He knows. He—he knows everything.

Almost everything.

Bruce swallows once, hard, and then wades in a single half-step: just far enough to shift one hand to the nape of Kent's neck, to tug him in and kiss him.

It should be error; error, or accident, or ungovernable impulse. But it isn't. He _wants_ to do it, wants to and does. The last secret he'd had, buried deepest—surrendered. He closes his eyes, settles his mouth more firmly still against Clark's, and discovers to his own distant surprise that it's almost exhilarating, to be so thoroughly and helplessly bared.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Clark hears himself make a startled noise in the back of his throat—and Bruce must hear it, too, because suddenly he's folded in on himself: reversing direction, away from Clark instead of toward, pulling back with the same sudden intensity he'd used to—

To _kiss_ Clark. It's such a small silly word for such a big thing; Clark had thought maybe with time, care, he'd be able to talk Batman into cooperating with him—into being his ally, if not his friend. And Bruce Wayne—Bruce Wayne might have kept showing up, might someday have been convinced to extend Superman the benefit of the doubt.

But that had been before the lab, before Luthor. Before the moment Clark had looked at Wayne and heard Batman, had wrapped his hand around Bruce's and known—

And it wasn't that he'd forgotten Batman's hostility, all Wayne's cutting words. But he remembered Wayne's kindness

( _You are._ )

just as well, Batman's blood

( _Nothing's changed_ —except it had, everything had—)

drying in the creases of his knuckles. There had already been something unsettling, hot and bright and a little bit dangerous, prickling up Clark's spine every time he'd thought about the man underneath that cowl, about his own fingertips resting along the line of that jaw—that isn't _less_ true now that he knows it's the same person who'd looked Superman in the eye with a smile and delivered teasing lines about taking his pants off.

And now—

Now Batman has saved his life, and Bruce Wayne's looked at him with wet, serious eyes and said _I'm sorry_ —hadn't wanted to hurt him but had done it anyway, for the sake of a roomful of frightened people, and Clark understands that better than anything.

"No, wait," he says against Bruce's mouth before Bruce can get too far; Bruce's wrists are still in Clark's hands, the sleeves shoved half up his forearms, and Clark rubs his thumbs against the insides of them, mindlessly soothing.

He's not exerting any pressure, doesn't want Bruce to feel trapped, but Bruce slows anyway—allows Clark to lean in again, to brush their lips together once, twice.

"Clark," Bruce says, hoarse and very low; and for a moment Clark's chest has wrung itself so tight, hearing it, that he can't quite breathe.

"You know my name," he says.

And Bruce looks at him silently for a long moment, dark and steady, and then draws one hand free of Clark's—but only to trace it along the line of Clark's cheek, his jaw, one side of his throat. "Well," he murmurs, and the arch of one eyebrow says the lightness in his tone is very much deliberate. "I guess I thought it was about time we got to know each other a little better."

Clark can't help but laugh. "Yeah, of course—because this is like the seventh date at least, right?"

He leans in again, with a vague half-formed intention of—of catching Bruce around the waist, maybe, crowding all that height and strength back toward the wall a bit and feeling it choose to give way to him; except the moment he draws in close, he stumbles, sudden squirming discomfort rising up and sharpening. He'd thought it was just left over from the pool, but—

"Wait," Bruce says, catching his arm.

"What?"

Bruce doesn't answer—not aloud. He looks at Clark and hesitates for a moment, and then reaches into his pocket and—

Clark flinches a little, helpless, at the sudden green glow. The rock. Of course. Bruce wouldn't have just left it lying around.

He's expecting Bruce to ask him about it, maybe; and he won't have a good answer, but it's entirely possible the ship knows exactly what it is and how it works. Except Bruce doesn't say anything. He just stands there, holding it, looking at Clark like he's waiting for something.

And he could have just kept it, Clark thinks slowly. He could have walked out of here with it safely tucked away, the same way Batman had left with the knife. But he'd chosen not to.

"Oh, you—you can keep it," Clark says.

Bruce's expression doesn't change, but Clark's still got one hand around his free wrist; he can feel the sudden coiled tension, the uncertainty.

"I can keep it," he repeats, soft and flat.

"If you want it?" Clark offers, at a loss. "Or if—I mean, I'm sure you have all kinds of ways to analyze it for yourself, but the ship might have something about this in its database. You could—"

"You'd let me," Bruce says.

Oh. Clark looks at him and thinks about it for a second, trying to figure out exactly how to say it. And then he squeezes Bruce's hand gently. "You're trusting me with your life, Mr. Wayne," he murmurs carefully. "I do understand that." And twice as much as he'd realized, at the time; because Clark had grabbed Batman by the face and shoved him into a wall, and Bruce Wayne had still come back to the park unarmored to watch the statue go up—had climbed up onto his ship and peppered him with questions, and—

And told him he was human.

"You've been trusting me all along," Clark says. "You've had to, even though you didn't want to—even though you had no reason to. I could have killed you a thousand times over and you knew it, and you still came back. You still helped me, you still saved Lois and Jimmy, you—you still saved me, today. What right could I possibly have to ask that of you if I won't do the same?"

He shrugs a little, helpless to express any better how sure he is; and then he realizes he's still hanging on to Bruce and deliberately lets go. Because Bruce can leave with the rock, if he wants to, and he should know that. There shouldn't be anything in his way, if that's what he wants to do, and he doesn't need Clark's permission.

But Bruce doesn't move. He stands there quietly, the rock in his hand, still looking at Clark. And then he turns with a slosh and wades over to the nearest wall. "Ship," he says, "are you—able to store this material safely?"

"Yes," the ship confirms.

"And you'll return it to him if he asks for it," Clark adds quickly.

"Yes. The order to accommodate the needs and requests of the individual identified as Bruce Wayne has not been countermanded."

"Oh. Right. Well, uh, yes—consider that order permanently in effect," Clark says, tipping his head back, and—oh.

It's still raining on them.

"Why is there a hole in the roof?" Clark says after a moment, staring up at it.

"Because it was the only way to get lightning inside," and Clark jerks and turns so sharply he has to use a little of the speed to keep from losing his balance, and meets the eyes of the woman standing on the other side of the genesis pool.

Who's presumably been waiting there and patiently watching them this whole time.

"Of course," Clark says belatedly, and offers her a sheepish smile. "Sorry. I, uh, I'm not sure we've met."

"We have," the woman corrects, "but only once. I believe I used the opportunity not to give a name, but rather to tell you how—"

"—greatly you admired the work I'd been doing," Clark says, the memory coming back to him all at once. "That was you."

The woman smiles, sweet and bright—and Clark remembers that, too, the warm confiding slant of her mouth; the way she'd looked at him as though they were already friends, or as though they would be soon. "Diana Prince," she says, as the ceiling weaves itself back together over her, and she wades unhesitatingly back across the pool to offer him her hand to shake.

 

 


	6. Remember—your handshake says a lot about you!

 

 

**Remember—your handshake says a lot about you!**

_For those cultures that value the handshake, plenty of meaning can be conveyed by very little! Some people use a handshake as an immediate first evaluation of their partner's character—so it pays to make sure your handshake is conveying what you want it to convey. Above all, be confident, greet your partner politely, and smile!_

 

Clark loves looking out across Metropolis at sunset, especially on a day like today.

Clear blue sky, warming in subtle gradations to yellow, gold, red; a few scattered clouds to catch the light, blazing with brilliant pinks and oranges; and coming after a long productive afternoon at the Planet, a piece successfully turned in on time to Perry with only a little shouting over Clark's idea of a newsworthy subject. Nothing that had demanded Superman's attention, either, except a small earthquake on the other side of the world—and that had hardly cracked a 5.0, mild structural damage and a few people trapped. Not bad at all.

And now he's free for the evening, suited up; and if something bad does happen, he'll be there.

But for the moment, he can just stand here and enjoy it, turn his face into the wind and smile, and listen for—

Ah. There it is.

He's grinning even as he turns around, gaze catching immediately on the familiar smooth shape drawing up close over the bow of the ship, and by the time Batman's lowered himself from the glider to the ship's surface, Clark is already right there waiting for him.

He can admit it, if only to himself: he'd been half-afraid Batman wouldn't show. Funny, sort of, that Clark should have had so much trouble getting Bruce Wayne to stay _away_ from the ship, and then had gotten himself stuck waiting on tenterhooks for Batman to arrive.

And maybe that had been part of it, too—not knowing what to expect. The moment he'd realized who he was looking at, in Luthor's lab, it had all seemed so obvious, so abruptly and wonderfully clear. But that isn't enough to put him on steady ground with Batman—Wayne— _Bruce_. Because everything he _does_ know about Bruce has only served to make it more obvious to him that there's a lot more he _doesn't_ , and—

And he wants to. He wants to, more than anything; but he's not sure whether Bruce will let him.

(Sometimes he thinks about the fact that one of those things he does know is how Bruce's mouth tastes; the noise of the soft almost-sound Bruce had made when Clark had drawn him close again; the way the fabric of Bruce Wayne's excruciatingly expensive slacks feels when it's wet—

And sometimes he's sure that Bruce giving him those things must mean Bruce will invite him to discover all the rest of it. That it's more likely, at least.

But sometimes he thinks maybe it means the exact opposite.)

Except now Bruce is standing in front of him, under a riotously beautiful sky after a good day, and Clark can't do anything but smile at him.

"Glad you could make it," Clark says, mild, with a quirk of his mouth.

Batman acknowledges this with a flat glance, and then flicks his gaze away—surveying the area, the ship and the park, even though he must know the ship will alert them if it detects anything amiss.

"It's all right," Clark tells him anyway, just in case. "There's hardly anybody around. Day like this, everyone's down at the waterfront. Look, Bruce—"

"No civilian names," Batman grits out, immediate.

"There's no one in earshot," Clark argues. "And it's not like it's conclusive; you're hardly the only person in the greater Metropolis area named Bruce."

"It's not a good idea—"

"Bruce—" Clark catches himself and grimaces. He shouldn't keep using it until _after_ he's won the argument. It's just—hard not to. "Sorry. I just—I don't know." He blows out a breath and then rubs sheepishly at the back of his neck; he actually _does_ know, he just doesn't want to say it.

But he's done lying to Bruce—lying, holding things back, pretending to be somebody he isn't, all of it. This isn't ever going to work if he keeps that up.

"Now that I can," he admits, looking away, "I—like to use it. That's all."

He risks a glance, and Bruce doesn't seem angry. Or at least not the parts of him Clark can see. He's just standing there, quiet, watching Clark. And it doesn't matter that so much of Bruce's face is covered, not anymore; Clark knows who he's looking at.

He lifts a hand, dares to skim the backs of his fingers against Bruce's jaw, and the sensation of touching Bruce hasn't lost any of its pull—Clark's leaning in without even really meaning to, heart pounding. Not even to kiss Bruce; just to be closer, as close as Bruce will let him get—

"Clark," Bruce says, so soft even the Batman modulator can't put much of an edge on it.

And he realizes what he's done before Clark does. Clark huffs out half a laugh, but Bruce has already jerked away sharply, out of Clark's reach, mouth set in a grim line.

"No—it's okay. I promise it's okay," Clark says. "Here, wait a second. Ship? Solid, please, but with simulated imagery."

And a moment later the hull of the ship wavers around them, and then swarms up all at once into a sphere around them like a bubble—gray-bronze tessellating pieces that settle into place and then ripple again, quick, into a perfect image of the park around them, drenched in rose-gold light: trees still visibly shifting with the breeze, the sun still sinking, and the faintest visual suggestion of curved panes.

"There. No one could see us, now, even if they were looking. I don't know whether we're audible, or if our vibrations can be picked up or something—"

"No," Bruce says, almost absently, still glancing up at the live simulation of sky above them. And then he looks at Clark and his mouth twists a little beneath the cowl, wry. "I tried that."

"Of course you did," Clark says with a grin, and he can't stop himself from reaching out again, running curious fingertips along the edge of the cowl where it cuts across Bruce's cheek.

"Clark," Bruce says again, and his tone has a warning in it—but he doesn't move away from Clark's hands this time.

"It does come off, right?" Clark asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes," Bruce says, very dry.

Clark laughs; and then he settles his palm against the side of Bruce's face, sturdy unliving material giving way so suddenly to—to warmth, to skin. Just a five o'clock shadow this time, he thinks dimly, suppressing a shiver, and suddenly nothing feels particularly funny anymore.

"Can I?" he murmurs.

"Who could stop you?"

Clark pulls his hand away, swallowing, stung. "You could. Anyone could. Bruce—you have to know that."

Bruce looks at him, silent. And if he really thinks Clark wouldn't just _listen_ to him—but when he moves, it isn't to step away, or to ask the ship to let him out. He lifts one gloved hand to his head, the other lower and to one side, does something quick and then pulls, and the cowl seems to soften somehow and then come free.

"I'm—sorry," he says, very low—and just his voice, now, the modulated microphone gone with the cowl. "That was uncalled-for."

"I shouldn't have pushed," Clark offers in return, careful. "I thought—after the pool—"

And with the cowl gone, he can see every flicker of expression Bruce allows across his face. "I shouldn't have done it. My judgment was compromised."

"You want to ignore it," Clark translates slowly.

"I wasn't thinking clearly," Bruce says, flat—which might almost sound like agreement, except Clark's had a lot of practice at listening a little more closely than most people. "I'd become aware of certain critical intelligence that altered the framework of my tactical assessment significantly. And then I—"

He stops short. A shadow of vague frustration forms across his brow, for an instant; he knows exactly what he wants to say, Clark thinks—is dismayed by the disobedience of his mouth in refusing to shape the words for him.

"You almost had to kill me," Clark fills in for him.

But that's not quite it: Bruce shakes his head once, a sharp jerk, almost involuntary. "I asked you, once," he says softly, "whether you knew what was at stake. I thought I did. But in the lab—that was the first time. Do you understand? That was the first time. If you had died then—"

And it's not so clean a cut this time; Clark can hear how Bruce's throat constricts, the ragged way he chokes himself off, and apparently he's just never going to be able to keep his hands to himself around Bruce.

A step, two, and he's close enough again to feel the phantom heat of Bruce through the body armor, to settle one hand against Bruce's chest and clasp another around the nape of his neck and tug him down until their foreheads brush. "I'm okay," Clark says.

"I had to," Bruce murmurs, half over him, words spilling and overlapping. "You were right there, you were—I felt you come alive again. I _had_ to," and Clark realizes with a jolt that he isn't talking about the stabbing; he's talking about the kiss.

And he's talking about it like he thinks this is an explanation Clark needs. Like he thinks Clark doesn't already understand. Clark laughs again—weird and ragged this time, but what is Bruce expecting? Clark had kissed him back, after all. "I know. Bruce—I _know_."

Bruce breaks away just far enough to meet Clark's eyes, intent, searching; desperate, but Clark just holds on and lets him look. And at last he lets out a quick uneven breath, drops the cowl and reaches up, and Clark's not even sure which of them closes the distance.

(He's definitely the one who makes the painfully embarrassing noise when Bruce's armored thigh slides between his, though.)

"Together, then," he murmurs, when they break apart long enough to let him. "All right? Together," and he holds out a hand.

"All right," Bruce agrees, after a moment, and shakes it.

 

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[ART] Left Side Advantage](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14505618) by [liodain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/liodain/pseuds/liodain)




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